The South Korean government plans to support President Obama’s ISIS strategy with humanitarian assistance aid:
South Korea expressed support Thursday for U.S. President Barack Obama’s plan for airstrikes in Syria and expanded strikes in Iraq to defeat the Islamic State militant group.
Obama said Wednesday he won’t hesitate to take action against the Islamic State in Syria, as he pledged to “degrade, and ultimately destroy” the extremists responsible for beheading two American journalists.
“South Korea voices its support to the efforts by the international community to defeat the Islamic State militant group,” Noh Kwang-il, spokesman for Seoul’s foreign ministry, told a regular press briefing. “As part of such support, Seoul has already announced its plan to provide a combined US$1.2 million in aid (to displaced Iraqi people).”
South Korea said in June and August that it plans to offer $200,000 in humanitarian assistance and an additional $1 million to help Iraqi refugees amid escalating violence in the country. [Yonhap]
Isn’t amazing that just a year ago the US wanted to bomb the Syrian government and now the US is planning to become the Syrian government’s Air Force. You can read more about the new ISIS strategy at this Yahoo News link, but here is another example of how so many things have flipped in such a short period of time:
Before the speech, senior administration officials cited the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force as the legal basis for taking the fight to Syria. Strikingly, a little over a year ago, in a major counterterrorism address at the National Defense University in Washington, Obama said he wanted to “refine and ultimately repeal” the AUMF, which President George W. Bush had relied on for his Global War on Terror.
