Bush signals backing for Syria sanctions

A bill to impose new economic sanctions on Syria will begin its passage through the US Congress today after the Bush administration gave the measures a green light to signal its frustration with Damascus.

Congressional staffers said the sanctions would sail through the House of Representatives this week, and would probably be passed by the Senate too, unless the administration changed its mind.

The White House has been blocking the Syria accountability bill for a year, while it pursued negotiations with Damascus, but this week the state department took a conspicuously neutral stance, saying the administration had no position on it.

The administration also refused to join international condemnation of Israeli air strikes on Syria over the weekend. President George Bush yesterday said the Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, had the right to "defend his people" but urged him to "avoid escalating violence".

A Republican congressional aide said the administration's signals were seen on Capitol Hill as a "green light for sanctions".

The change in position is a victory for US conservatives who have long advocated a tougher stance against Syria because of its support for Hizbullah, and other armed anti-Israeli groups.

After the fall of Baghdad, rightwingers in the Pentagon promoted a contingency plan for military action against Syria but it was vetoed by the White House.

Under pressure from Washington, Syria closed the offices of radical Palestinian groups such as Islamic Jihad and Hamas, and it handed over several officials from the Saddam regime who had fled across the border.

However, Washington has remained unconvinced by the measures.

Daniel Byman, a Middle East expert at Georgetown University, said there was "a perception in the administration that there have been cosmetic gestures to cut support for various Palestinian groups, but in reality that support remained quite strong".

Washington has also complained about the flow of guerrilla fighters over the Syrian-Iraqi border.

"Syria has been a problem; the flow of people down through the Syrian border into Iraq has been a problem," the defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, said earlier this week.

"We've arrested something in excess of 200 foreign fighters who've come in and an overwhelming majority of them are Syrian."

If passed, the Syria accountability law would impose a ban on the export of "dual-use" technology to Syria and authorise President Bush to choose from a menu of further sanctions against Syria, including curbs on US businesses in Syria, and a freezing of Syrian assets in the US.

The bill will be voted on today by the House of Representatives international relations committee and will then go to the floor of the house within days for a full vote. A congressional staffer said yesterday it would be passed overwhelmingly in both votes.

The outcome in the Senate is less certain. In the past, sanctions bills have been opposed in principle by senators from farming states, which depend heavily on exports.