Vatican: U.N. Caught in Crossfire over Syria

The Vatican's official daily on Tuesday criticized global powers for preparing possible military action against Syria despite an ongoing U.N. investigation into an alleged chemical weapons attack near Damascus.

"The tones are becoming ever more drastic and the action being taken by the United Nations appears subjected to a sort of crossfire," the newspaper said.

"Various international actors appear no longer to consider the investigation a determining factor," it said, adding that "what commitment there was" to a negotiated settlement "appears to be dying out".

The Vatican's permanent observer at the United Nations in Geneva, Monsignor Silvano Tomasi, last week cast doubt on the Syrian regime's responsibility for the apparent chemical attack in the suburbs of Damascus.

The Vatican is against any armed intervention, pointing to the havoc caused by the U.S.-led war to topple Saddam Hussein in Iraq in 2003.