MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 14th November, 2019) The United States has been pillaging Syria under the pretext of securing its oil fields and funneling ill-gotten money to anti-government forces, senior Russian defense official Col. Gen. Mikhail Mizintsev said on Thursday.
"A number of US troops has been returned to positions east of the Euphrates River allegedly to protect oil rigs when in fact they are looting hydrocarbons for profit and with the goal of funding anti-government forces," he said.
The general, who heads Russia's National Center for State Defense Control, said at a joint meeting of the Russian-Syrian coordination headquarters that US plundering deprived the Syrian people of their national wealth and prevented the economy from rebounding.
US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that his government intended to retain control of the oil fields in northeastern Syria despite scaling down its military presence in the area. About 90 percent of Syrian oil is concentrated to the east of the Euphrates River.
