U.S. accuses Russia of war crimes in Syria, seeks investigation

PanARMENIAN.Net - The U.S. bluntly accused Russia on Friday, October 7 of hacking American political sites and email accounts in an effort to interfere with the upcoming presidential election. In a one-two punch, the United States also directly accused Russia of war crimes in Syria, the Associated Press reports.

Moscow dismissed the accusations, which significantly worsen U.S.-Russia relations that already had deteriorated to the lowest point in years. Russian officials called the hacking allegations "some kind of nonsense" and said the war crimes talk was simply an effort to divert attention from America's own failure to uphold a ceasefire in the bloody war.

The White House declined to say whether the hacking accusation would trigger sanctions against Russia. A senior Obama administration official said the U.S. would respond "at a time and place of our choosing."

Secretary of State John Kerry said that Russian and Syrian military strikes against civilians and medical facilities in Syria should be investigated as war crimes. The situation in Syria has dramatically worsened since the collapse of a U.S.-Russia-brokered cease-fire two weeks ago.

"These are acts that beg for an appropriate investigation of war crimes," Kerry said. "They're beyond the accidental now, way beyond, years beyond the accidental. This is a targeted strategy to terrorize civilians and to kill anybody and everybody who is in the way of their military objectives."