Share prices on Bursa Malaysia opened higher, continuing its rally from last week, with buying interest by fund managers in selected heavyweights and index-linked counters, dealers said.
After 15 minutes of trading, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) advanced 8.39 points to 1,667.24, pushed by gains mostly seen in Petronas Gas and Sime Darby.
Petronas Gas jumped 7.225 per cent or RM1.38 to RM20.48 and Sime Darby rose 11 sen or 1.176 per cent to RM9.46.
The Finance Index improved 44.721 points to 15,236.32, the Industrial Index gained 53.66 points to 2,770.98 and the Plantation Index increased 14.92 points to 7,994.44.
The FBM Emas Index jumped 46.93 points to 11,284.1, the FBMT100 was 50 points higher at 11,146.6 and the FBM Mid 70 Index rose 26.5 points to 12,116.25 but the FBM Ace Index eased 1.61 points to 4,199.09.
Gainers led losers 86 to 80, with 105 counters unchanged, 1,375 untraded and 31 others were suspended.
Volume stood at 36.756 million shares worth RM27.842 million.
Among actives, TH Heavy Engineering shed half-a-sen to 56 sen, TH Heavy Engineering-WA slipped one sen to 34.5 sen while XOX was unchanged at 21.5 sen.
Heavyweights, Maybank added one sen to RM9.05 while both CIMB and Axiata rose two sen each to RM7.65 and RM6.59, respectively.
Meanwhile, Tradewinds, Tradewinds Plantation and Padiberas Nasional Bhd (Bernas) have requested for suspension of trading today pending an announcement of a material corporate proposal.
It was reported earlier that Tradewinds might privatise both Tradewinds Plantations and Bernas and streamline all its commodity-based businesses under one listed company. Bernama
The ringgit was lower against the US dollar this morning on lack of interest for riskier assets ahead of the Christmas and New Year holidays.
At 9am, the ringgit was traded at 3.0700/0730 against the greenback from 3.0585/0615 on Friday.
However, the ringgit was mostly mixed against other major currencies.
It eased against the Singapore dollar to 2.5117/5145 from 2.5064/5098 but was marginally higher against the yen at 3.6349/6397 from 3.6359/6407 on Friday.
The local currency appreciated against the British pound to 4.9565/9629 from 4.9688/9749 but was down against the euro at 4.0438/0484 from 4.0418/0467,previously. Bernama
The National Rifle Association stood firm in its opposition to any new gun laws on Sunday, as one of its top officials blasted an effort by Sen. Dianne Feinstein to re-institute an assault weapons ban.
Feinstein, D-Calif., has promised to introduce legislation when Congress reconvenes next year that would reinstate an assault weapons ban that Congress passed in 1994 but which lapsed a decade later
"It's a phony piece of legislation and I don't think it will pass for this reason : It's all built on lies," said NRA Vice President Wayne LaPierre, in an interview on NBC's Meet the Press.
The comments from LaPierre follow his group's call on Friday for more armed guards in schools.
"We're going to support an immediate appropriation before Congress to put police officers in every school," LaPierre said on Sunday.
About 70% of public schools don't have police officer and almost 60% don't have any security staff. Those with police tend to be big and urban schools, according to a USA TODAY data analysis.
The NRA proposal has been criticized by some Democrats and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a Republican, who question the wisdom of putting weapons in an educational environment.
But in a separate interview on Sunday, Asa Hutchinson, a former Congressman from Arkansas who is leading NRA's push for putting armed guards in schools, defended the proposal.
"Let's compare this back to the federal air marshal program on airplanes," Hutchinson told ABC's This Week. "There was intense debate that on airplanes, guns have no place, and yet we have a federal air marshal program that I helped to oversee, and which has provided a deterrent. It has increased the safety of the airlines, and it's not like it's an armed camp when you go on the airlines."
LaPierre and the NRA were pilloried by some news organizations following their comments Friday, with the conservative New York Post disparaging LaPierre as "gun nut" and a "loon."
The interview was the first by LaPierre since the Newtown, Conn., tragedy. He echoed remarks he made in an event Friday billed by the NRA as a news conference -- though he took no questions—in which he charged the media and anti-gun lobbyists are intent on blaming guns whenever there is a tragedy.
"I know there's a media machine in this country that wants to blame guns every time something happens," he said, adding, "I know there's an anti-gun industry in this town.
CAIRO (AP) — Egypt's opposition said Sunday it will keep fighting the Islamist-backed constitution after the Muslim Brotherhood, the main group backing the charter, claimed it passed with a 64% "yes" vote in a referendum.
The opposition alleged vote fraud and demanded an investigation — a sign that the referendum will not end the turmoil that has roiled this country for nearly two years since the uprising that ousted authoritarian leader Hosni Mubarak. Many Egyptians, especially the tens of millions who live in extreme poverty, had hoped the new constitution might usher in a period of more stability.
A heated political debate over the past month leading up to the referendum at times erupted into deadly street battles. There were no mass opposition demonstrations on Sunday after the unofficial results came out.
Renewed violence and political tensions have further imperiled Egypt's already precarious economy, reeling from dwindling resources and a cash-strapped government whose plans to borrow from the International Monetary Fund had to be pushed back because of the turmoil.
The finance ministry said Sunday the budget deficit reached $13 billion in the five months from July-November, about 4.5% higher compared to the same period last year.
Official results of the referendum are not expected until Monday. If the unofficial numbers are confirmed, it will be a victory Islamist President Mohammed Morsi, who is from the Brotherhood.
But the opposition allegations look likely to prolong the fight. Beyond allegations of fraud, the opposition will likely challenge new laws issued on the basis of the constitution as well as Morsi's economic policies.
"The referendum is not the end game. It is only a battle in this long struggle for the future of Egypt," said the National Salvation Front, the main opposition group. "We will not allow a change to the identity of Egypt or the return of the age of tyranny."
The opposition claims the new constitution seeks to enshrine Islamic rule in Egypt and accuses the Islamists of trying to monopolize power.
Critics say it does not sufficiently protect the rights of women and minority groups and empowers Muslim clerics by giving them a say over legislation. Some articles were also seen as tailored to get rid of Islamists' enemies and undermine the freedom of labor unions.
The latest political battle began with Morsi's Nov. 22 decrees that gave him powers to protect the Islamist-dominated panel writing the constitution and dismiss the country's top prosecutor, a holdover from the Mubarak era.
Although Morsi subsequently rescinded the powers that gave him immunity from judicial oversight, his decision to replace the prosecutor general was viewed by many in the judiciary as trampling over their powers. Hundreds of prosecutors held a rally Sunday demanding the new, Morsi-appointed prosecutor general quit, days after he retracted his resignation claiming it was rendered under pressure.
The prosecutors said in a news conference that they will be on strike until he quits.
Scores of lawyers who support Morsi's decision held an earlier rally, demanding that the top prosecutor stay, and accusing the opposition of being "thugs."
One major concern in the aftermath of the constitutional turmoil is Egypt's deteriorating economy, which has been battered by the two years of turmoil and taken an added hit from renewed violence recently.
Adding to the anxiety, state television reported on Saturday amidst voting on the referendum that the central bank governor had resigned, then retracted the report. The governor turned up at a meeting of the government's economic team Sunday in an apparent attempt to quell nervousness over the state of the economy.
The government stressed the urgency of stability.
"The financial and economic situations are dire," government spokesman Alaa el-Hadidi said, according to comments published by the state news agency MENA. With the referendum behind, el-Hadidi said economic policies must be at the center of attention, adding that the government will work to improve the investment environment to attract foreign investors.
The government had to postpone a request for $4.8 billion of IMF loans, putting off unpopular tax increases and reforms to after the referendum for fear they would only stoke political tensions.
A day before the official results of the constitution are expected, the opposition front said it filed complaints to the country's top prosecutor and the election commission asking for an investigation.
"The results of the referendum are for sure because of the rigging, violations and mismanagement that characterized it," the National Salvation Front said.
It alleged the vote was marred by lack of complete judicial supervision, which led to overcrowding that pushed down the voting rate. It also charged there was interference by those who were supposed to be supervising the vote, with some instructing people to vote "yes." Many judges who traditionally supervise elections boycotted supervising the vote.
"We don't think the results reflect the true desires of the Egyptian people," Khaled Dawoud, the front's spokesman, told The Associated Press.
However, the Brotherhood insisted violations were limited and should not affect the referendum's integrity.
The Freedom and Justice Party, the Brotherhood's political arm, said it hoped the passage of the constitution would be a "historic opportunity" to heal Egypt's divisions and launch a dialogue to restore stability and build state institutions.
If the violations are considered serious enough, there could be new votes in some areas that alter the results slightly.
The referendum was conducted in two stages with the first vote on Dec. 15 and the second on Saturday. The Muslim Brotherhood and some media outlets have accurately tallied the outcome of past elections by compiling numbers released by electoral officials at thousands of individual polling stations shortly after voting closes.
Turnout for the vote was 32% of Egypt's more than 51 million eligible voters, according to the Muslim Brotherhood. That was significantly lower than other elections since the uprising ended in February 2011. The opposition has pointed to the low turnout as well as allegations of violations in the voting to cast doubt on the legitimacy of the referendum.
The Brotherhood said 64% voted "yes" to the constitution in a tally of both stages of voting. For Saturday's second stage only, the Brotherhood said 71% of those who voted said "yes" with 99% of polling stations accounted for.
As expected, it was a jump from the first round of voting when about 56% said "yes." The provinces that voted in the second round were known for being a base for Brotherhood supporters.
Only about eight million of the 25 million Egyptians eligible to vote in the second stage — a turnout of about 30% — cast their ballots. Some 32% of eligible voters participated in the first round.
The Front said that regardless of the results, it welcomed the participation of many who rejected the constitution and refused to consider it a vote on Islamic law. The group vowed to continue to "democratically" work to change the constitution and praised the high turnout of women.
The Islamists say Islam is core to Egypt's identity and they view the constitution as a foundation to move forward, elect a parliament and build state institutions.
The new constitution will come into effect once official results are announced.
Once that happens, Morsi is expected to call for the election of parliament's lower chamber, the more powerful of the legislature's two houses, within two months.
The opposition said that even though it is challenging the results of the referendum, it will continue to prepare for the upcoming parliamentary elections.
Until the lower chamber is elected, the normally toothless upper house, or Shura Council, will have legislative powers.
On Sunday, Morsi appointed 90 new members to the Islamist-controlled Shura Council as part of his efforts to make the council more representative. The new appointments included at least 30 Islamists and a dozen Christians. They also include eight women, four of them Christians.
The opposition front said it did not want its members nominated to the Shura Council, now made up of 270 members.
Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
(CBS News) On Friday, as funerals and memorials continued for the victims of the deadly school shooting in Newtown, Conn., the National Rifle Association made its first public comment on the tragedy.
NRA Chief Executive Wayne LaPierre rejected calls for more gun restrictions, and instead stated that "gun-free" zones made schools less safe by inviting criminals with guns into unprotected areas.
LaPierre insisted, "The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun."
LaPierre went on to add, "When it comes to our most beloved innocent and vulnerable members of the American family -- our children -- we as a society leave them every day utterly defenseless."
Lapierre's comments also drew quick reaction from politicians, many of them sharply criticizing the gun lobby's response.
But the reaction to the NRA's public stance was more tempered in Newtown, Conn., as parents grapple with finding a resolution that will protect their children at school.
"There are some people I am sure who will say, 'Let's put more policemen in our schools, or bullet-proof doors or windows in our schools," Andrei Nikitchyuk, the father of a third grader who survived the Sandy Hook school shooting, told CBS News' Elaine Quijano. "What I could tell them would be, 'Do you really [want] to have a shootout in our schools like the OK-Corral, in our schools?'"
But another Sandy Hook parent says the NRA's rallying cry for such school security measures is a step in the right direction.
"We are a nation of strong opinions and strong beliefs," said Desiree Vaiuso, whose daughter survived the shooting. "And some of us are changing our minds."
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NEW YORK: US stocks sank Friday in the absence of a deal to avert the looming "fiscal cliff" crisis just days before a deadline.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended the session down 120.88 points (0.91 per cent) at 13,190.84.
The broad-market S&P 500 fell 13.54 points (0.94 per cent) to 1,430.15, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite dipped 29.38 points (0.96 per cent) to 3,021.01.
Washington has until the end of the year to stop the United States from going over the so-called fiscal cliff, a mix of tax hikes and spending cuts that experts say could drag the world's biggest economy into recession if they go into effect on January 1.
A Republican plan to let tax breaks expire for US millionaires collapsed late Thursday when it failed to earn enough party support, leaving talks in limbo.
Republican leaders said they were not walking away from talks but a compromise remains elusive.
The cancellation of a vote on the Republican plan in the House of Representatives due to lagging support "provided the lion's share of the negative sentiment, even as (House) Speaker (John) Boehner left the door open for further negotiations with President Obama," said Charles Schwab analysts.
Concern about the "fiscal cliff" appeared to overshadow new, positive economic data, including an uptick in consumer spending, the key driver of the US economy.
Personal spending climbed 0.4 per cent while personal income rose 0.6 per cent, the Commerce Department said.
The latest data on new orders for manufactured durable goods, meanwhile, showed these indicators were up 0.7 per cent.
Shares of BlackBerry maker Research In Motion took a beating on investor fears that its new smartphone platform will thin the ranks paying for its service. It sank 22.7 per cent.
Other stocks in focus included media conglomerate News Corp., which said it had filed a document with US regulators detailing its split into two independent companies. It lost 1.9 per cent.
Investors were also eyeing General Electric, down 0.8 per cent, which announced it would buy the aviation activities of Italian engine maker Avio for US$4.3 billion.
ConocoPhillips slipped 1.1 per cent. Late Thursday, the Houston-based energy giant said it had agreed to sell its Nigerian operations to growing African group Oando for US$1.79 billion. -- AFP
In a press conference reflecting on last week's massacre in Newtown, Conn., the National Rifle Association's Wayne LaPierre today insisted that increased gun laws would not have prevented the violence that felled 20 first-graders at Sandy Hook Elementary School -- and instead called on Congress to put armed police officers in every school in America.
LaPierre, whose remarks were interrupted twice by pro-gun control protesters, disdained the notion that stricter gun laws could have prevented "monsters" like Adam Lanza from committing mass shootings, and wondered why schools, unlike banks, don't have the protection of armed forces.
"The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun," he said.
Rolling out a proposal to help governments train and provide security at schools, LaPierre argued that children should benefit from the same protection Congress members enjoy.
"We must speak for the safety of our nation's children," said LaPierre. "We care about our money, so we protect our banks with armed guards. American airports, office buildings, power plants, courthouses, even sports stadiums, are all protected by armed security. We care about our president, so we protect him with armed Secret Service agents. Members of Congress works in offices surrounded by Capitol police officers, yet when it comes to our most beloved innocent and vulnerable members of the American family -- our children -- we as a society leave them every day utterly defenseless. And the monsters and the predators of the world know it and exploit it."
"That must change now," argued LaPierre, moments before being interrupted by a protester carrying a large pink sign proclaiming that the "NRA is killing our kids." "The truth is that our society is populated by an unknown number of genuine monsters -- people so deranged, so evil, so possessed by voices and driven by demons that no sane person can possibly ever comprehend them. They walk among us every day. And does anybody really believe that the next Adam Lanza isn't planning his attack on a school he's already identified at this very moment?"
Alternately criticizing politicians, the media, and the entertainment industry, LaPierre argued that "the press and political class here in Washington [are] so consumed by fear and hatred of the NRA and America's gun owners" that they overlook what he claims is the real solution to the nation's recent surge in mass shootings -- and what, he said, could have saved lives last week.
"What if, when Adam Lanza started shooting his way into Sandy Hook Elementary School last Friday, he had been confronted by qualified, armed security?" he asked. "Will you at least admit it's possible that 26 innocent lives might have been spared? Is that so abhorrent to you that you would rather continue to risk the alternative?"
LaPierre called on Congress to put a police officer in every school across the nation, which according to a Slate analysis would cost the nation at least $5.4 billion. LaPierre recognized that local budgets are "strained," but urged Congress to"to act immediately, to appropriate whatever is necessary to put armed police officers in every school." He offered up the NRA's unique "knowledge, dedication, and resources" to assist in efforts to train those forces, but made no mention of a fiscal contribution.
In a statement announcing the press conference earlier this week, the NRA broke its post-Newtown silence to say it was "prepared to offer meaningful contributions to help make sure this never happens again."
President Obama announced the creation of a task force aimed at providing actionable policy ideas to prevent or reduce gun violence in America.
Vice President Joe Biden, a key author of the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban, will helm the task force, and cabinet members and outside groups will be called on for ideas and contributions.
Many believe that in the wake of the tragedy, the political will to reinstate the assault weapons ban, which expired in 2004, will increase. The president long has supported a ban, but exerted little effort to get it passed during his first term. According to White House spokesman Jay Carney, Mr. Obama also would support closing a "gun show loophole" allowing people to buy arms from private dealers without background checks, and would be interested in legislation limiting high-capacity ammunition magazines.
Even while the president has acknowledged the political difficulties associated with gun laws, he said this week that the complexity of the problem "can no longer be an excuse for doing nothing."
Unlike in the cases of previous mass murders, new evidence suggests Americans increasingly support tougher gun control in the wake of the Newtown massacres. According to a recent CBS News poll, support for stricter gun laws is the highest it's been in a decade, surging 18 points since the spring of this year.
According to that poll, conducted Dec. 14 - 16, 57 percent of Americans now say gun control laws should be made more strict. That's up 10 points from January 2011 -- following the shooting of then-Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in Arizona -- when a CBS News poll found that 47 percent of Americans backed stricter gun laws. In April of this year, just 39 percent of Americans supported stricter gun laws.
In a statement today, Daniel Gross, the president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, urged NRA members to "join us" in fighting to end gun violence.
"To the 74 percent of NRA members who support requiring a criminal background check of anyone purchasing a gun...To the 87 percent of NRA members who believe that the 2nd Amendment can coexist with efforts to keep illegal guns out of the hands of criminals... To all NRA members who believe like we do, that we are better than this, we send this message... Join us," he wrote. "Join us in making sure the gun violence ends now. We are all Americans and we all agree we are better than this."
WASHINGTON — President Obama plans to nominate Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts as secretary of state, a senior administration official said. He would succeed Hillary Rodham Clinton and become the first member of Mr. Obama's second-term national security team.
The appointment of Mr. Kerry, a Massachusetts Democrat and his party's former presidential nominee in 2004, has been widely expected since last week, when Susan E. Rice, the ambassador to the United Nations, asked Mr. Obama to withdraw her candidacy for the post.
Ms. Rice had come under weeks of attack from Republicans in Congress over her role in the aftermath of the deadly attack on the United States mission in Benghazi, Libya. Mr. Kerry, as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, oversaw a hearing on Benghazi on Thursday, at which the State Department came under renewed criticism for its failure to respond to requests for additional security in Libya.
The decision by Mr. Obama, expected to be announced early Friday afternoon, comes at a time when Mrs. Clinton has been recovering from a concussion suffered earlier this month. Mrs. Clinton, who has long said she would leave the post after Mr. Obama's first term, is not expected to attend the announcement.
An elder of the Democratic foreign-policy establishment, Mr. Kerry, 69, has long coveted the job of secretary of state. He built close ties to Mr. Obama, giving him the keynote speech assignment that helped begin his national political career at the Democratic convention in 2004 and becoming an early Senate supporter of Mr. Obama's presidential run.
Mr. Kerry has carried out several diplomatic missions for the Obama administration, helping to persuade President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan to agree to a runoff election in 2009. Early in the administration, he also tried to engage President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, who has waged a brutal crackdown on his own people as he fights to cling to power.
President Obama does not intend to name a new secretary of defense or director of the Central Intelligence Agency on Friday, an official said.
One of the front-runners for the Pentagon post, former Senator Chuck Hagel, is fighting off a series of criticisms of his record, not unlike the campaign that dogged Ms. Rice. The White House has defended Mr. Hagel, though officials said on Thursday that Mr. Obama had not yet decided whom to nominate for that post.
The contest for C.I.A. has come down to two names: Michael J. Morrell, the current acting director, and John O. Brennan, the president's counterterrorism adviser.
Share prices on Bursa Malaysia opened mixed Friday on mild buying demand as most investors stayed on the sidelines ahead of the Christmas and New Year holidays despite gains in other regional bourses, dealers said.
As at 9.16 am, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) stood at 1,667.78, down 2.82 points, after opening 3.51 points lower at 1,667.09.
Regionally, sentiments were broadly positive due to the bullish Wall Street overnight performance following the better-than-expected US economic data.
The world's largest economy grew at 3.1 per cent annual rate in the third quarter, higher than previously reported.
Back home, the Finance Index rose 0.88 of a point to 15,246.2 but the Industrial Index slipped 3.87 points to 2,736.21 and the Plantation Index declined 19.94 points to 8,052.39.
The FBM Emas Index fell 16.43 points to 11,300.1, the FBMT100 eased 18.14 points to 11,158.66 and the FBM Mid 70 Index lost 16.36 points to 12,168.25.
The FBM Ace Index, however, increased 16.05 points to 4,217.48.
Gainers led losers 89 to 73, with 109 counters unchanged, 1,375 untraded and 25 others suspended.
Volume stood at 45.193 million shares worth RM25.409 million.
Among actives, Oversea Enterprise garnered three sen to 15.5 sen, Opensys was up one sen to 13.5 sen and Sumatec inched up half-a-sen to 20 sen.
MAS lost one sen to 73 sen and Scomi shed half-a-sen to 36 sen while Karambunai was flat at 12 sen.
Heavyweights, Axiata and Maxis rose one sen each to RM6.69 and RM6.57, respectively, and Public Bank earned six sen to RM16.10.
CIMB lost four sen to RM7.64 but Maybank was flat at RM9.05. Bernama
The ringgit was traded lower against the US dollar in the early session Friday as investors shifted demand to the greenback as the US economy grew in the third quarter, dealers said.
At 9.20 am, the ringgit was pegged at 3.0600/0630 against the US dollar from yesterday's 3.0535/0565 close.
The greenback received a boost after the US economy expanded by 3.1 per cent in the third quarter, driven by exports, government and consumer spending.
On the local front, the ringgit was traded mixed against other major currencies.
The local currency fell against the Singapore dollar to 2.5055/5084 from Thursday's close at 2.5035/5066 but rose against the Japanese yen to 3.6346/6395 from 3.6360/6409 yesterday.
The local unit, however, weakened against the British pound to 4.9713/9774 from yesterday's 4.9674/9735 close but appreciated against the euro to 4.0368/0419 from 4.0389/0431 Thursday. Bernama
NYSE Euronext agreed to sell itself to rival IntercontinentalExchange Inc. for about $8.2 billion, in a deal that would end more than two centuries of independence for the New York Stock Exchange.
The deal would create the largest trans-Atlantic operator of derivatives and equity exchanges and an enlarged platform for an expected rush of new business as regulators push the huge over-the-counter trading market to operate through exchanges. It would present a formidable competitor to larger, but less-diversified peers such as CME Group Inc. and Germany's Deutsche Börse AG.
While regulatory resistance has sunk prior attempts at big mergers, the ...
Journalists attend Russian President Vladimir Putin's annual news conference in Moscow. (Kirill Kudryavtsev / Agence France-Presse / Getty Images)
By Sergei L. Loiko
December 20, 2012, 9:11 a.m.
MOSCOW -- President Vladimir Putin on Thursday further distanced his government from Syria's leader, saying Russia would not back Bashar Assad's regime "at any price" and recognized the need for a change in the Middle Eastern nation.
"We are not concerned with the fate of Assad's regime," Putin said during his annual news conference in Moscow. "We understand what is going on, given that the [Assad] family has been in power for 40 years and that the need of change is certainly on the agenda."
Putin said the Kremlin's "position is not to back Assad and his regime in power at any price." However, he said that the Syrian conflict needed to be resolved by negotiation.
"I think agreements based on a military victory are out of place here and cannot be effective," Putin said, adding: "What will happen there primarily depends on the Syrian people themselves."
Russia, along with Iran, has been one of the Assad government's few dependable international allies. However, there has been a change of tone in recent comments from Moscow.
On Dec. 13, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov said the rebels might succeed in ousting Assad, a public acknowledgment that surprised international observers. The Russian government sought to backtrack the next day, insisting the diplomat was merely characterizing the views of Syrian rebels, not stating Moscow's position.
The changing tone in Moscow reflects frustration on the part of the Kremlin, said one analyst.
"Obviously the Kremlin tried to assert its influence recently to compel Assad make some compromises in his unwavering stand based on violence and military pressure and even start some negotiations and make some other steps toward reconciliation, but to no avail," said Andrei Kortunov, president of New Eurasia Foundation, a Moscow-based think tank, in an interview Wednesday.
"That certainly rubbed Putin the wrong way, and the Russian leader is having a hard time hiding his irritation with Assad," Korutnov said.
"The time is working against Assad, and Moscow increasingly understands that the longer the civil war goes the less chances Assad has to come out victorious," Kortunov added. "The Kremlin's rhetoric we heard today in regard to Assad was unthinkable just a few months ago."
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