Saudi Renews Offer to Deploy Troops to Syria

Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir has reaffirmed the kingdom's willingness to deploy troops to Syria as part of U.S.-led efforts to stabilize the conflict-torn country.

"We are in discussions with the U.S. and have been since the beginning of the Syrian crisis (in 2011) about sending forces into Syria," Jubeir said at a press conference in Riyadh with U.N. chief Antonio Guterres.

The comments were in response to a Wall Street Journal report on Monday that U.S. President Donald Trump's administration was seeking to assemble an Arab force, including troops from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, to replace a U.S. military contingent in Syria.

The report follows weekend strikes by the United States, Britain and France against Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad's government that hit targets they said were linked to a state chemical weapons programme.

Jubeir emphasized that the proposal to send its troops as part of a broader international coalition was "not new."

"We made a proposal to the (previous U.S.) Obama administration that if the US were to send forces... then Saudi Arabia would consider along with other countries sending forces as part of this contingent," he said.

Before the weekend's Western strikes, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had indicated that the kingdom would back an international military action in Syria.

Guterres, who also met Saudi King Salman on Tuesday, emphasised the need for a political solution in Syria, free of foreign interference.

Syria's war, the most tangled of the region's conflicts, is a key point of contention pitting Riyadh and its allies, who mainly back Sunni Muslim rebels, against regime backer Iran and its Lebanese ally Hizbullah.

Riyadh and Shiite rival Tehran also back opposing sides in other hotspots across the mainly Sunni Middle East, including Lebanon, Iraq and Saudi Arabia's southern neighbour, Yemen.