Charlie Rose Interviews Syria's Bashar Al-Assad In Damascus

[jakeXT]

Charlie Rose interviewed Syria's president Bashar al-Assad in Damascus on Sunday.

CBS News' Bob Schieffer announced the news on "Face the Nation" Sunday. The full interview will air on the "Charlie Rose Show" Monday night — the same day as President Obama's recorded interviews with six networks. Portions of the interview will also air on Monday's "CBS This Morning," and other platforms across CBS News.

Rose previewed the interview on Sunday, speaking on the phone from Beirut. He told Schieffer that al-Assad "denied that he had anything to do with the attack."

Rose traveled to the palace in Damascus for the sit-down. He was accompanied by Jeff Fager, the president of CBS News. The interview comes as the White House attempts to make the case for U.S. military intervention in Syria.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/08/charlie-rose-bashar-al-assad_n_3890294.html

(Assad) denied that he had anything to do with the attack. He denied that he knew there was a chemical attack, notwithstanding what has been said and notwithstanding the videotape. He said there’s not enough evidence to make a conclusive judgment. He would not say even, even though I read him the lead paragraph of the New York Times today in the story about their chemical weapons supply. And he said I cannot confirm or deny that we do have them. He did however say that if in fact we do have them and I am not going to say yes or no, they are in centralized control and no one else has access to them.

He suggested as he has before that perhaps the rebels had something to do with it, he made some reference to Aleppo. The most important thing he said there has been no evidence that I used chemical weapons against my own people and that there is no evidence of that. And if in fact the administration had evidence of that they should show that evidence and make their case. I then obviously repeated the fact that Secretary Kerry is in the process of making the case and that in fact that information is being shown to members of congress as they begin to come back to Washington and consider an authorization for the President to make a military strike.

He said that he did not necessarily know whether there was going to be a military strike. He said that they were obviously as prepared as they could be for a strike. He said there would be, suggested that there would be, among people that are aligned with him some kind of retaliation if a strike was made that that would be, what would be, that he would not even talk about the nature of the response. He had a message to the American people that it had not been a good experience for them to get involved in the Middle East in wars and conflicts in the Middle East, that the results had not been good and they should not get involved and that they should communicate to their congress and to their leadership in Washington not to authorize a strike. [...]

Bob, that was the very first question I asked: Do you expect an attack? He said, I don’t know. He said we prepared as best we can. He did not say that he assumed there was going to be an attack in Syria because of the chemical weapons. I also pursued the question of whether there was anything that he was prepared to do anything to stop the attack, for example to give up chemical weapons, if that would stop the attack. I also raised the question with him did he fear that if there was an attack, it would degrade his own military, and therefore make it more likely that it might tip the balance. He’s very, very concerned about that as an issue.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2013/09/charlie-rose-interviews-bashar-alassad-172052.html