US evacuates some staff, ups pressure on Syria

Apr 26, 2011 |

Washington

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The United States has ordered embassy families and some staff out of Syria as it has hardened its tone on Damascus's crackdown on protests without calling for President Bashar al-Assad to go.

The state department on Monday ordered embassy family members and some non-emergency personnel to leave Syria, after an earlier travel warning telling US citizens to leave the country because of escalating attacks on protesters.

At the same time, Washington has defended the presence of a US ambassador in Damascus, who only arrived after a six-year absence in January, as Assad's forces deployed tanks and snipers, killing at least 25 people in a key town.

"The brutal violence used by the government of Syria against its people is completely deplorable and we condemn it in the strongest possible terms," national security council spokesman Tommy Vietor said on Tuesday.

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