Furious Putin calls US airstrikes an 'illegal act of aggression' and suspends deal to avoid mid-air clashes with American fighter jets over Syria

·       US fired dozens of missiles at Syrian airbase in the wake of a deadly gas attack

·       Vladimir Putin says strikes broke international law and harm US-Russia relations

·       Russian President's spokesman called it 'aggression against a sovereign nation'

Furious Vladimir Putin has called the US airstrikes on Syria an 'illegal act of aggression' and suspended a deal to avoid mid-air clashes with American fighter jets over the war-torn country.

The Russian President warned of grave damage to relations between Washington and Moscow which are already 'in tatters'

The United States fired dozens of cruise missiles at a Syrian airbase from which it said a deadly chemical weapons attack was launched this week.

Syrian Army officials described the attack as an act of 'blatant aggression', saying it had made the US 'a partner' of ISIS, the ex-Nusra Front and other 'terrorist organisations'. 

Moscow received signals the US was launching an airstrike about 30 minutes in advance, according to a Russian ambassador to the UN - but the Trump administration did not seek the Kremlin's approval. It is not known it the Russians then alerted the Syrians about the incoming strikes.

The strikes hit the government-controlled Shayrat air base in central Syria, where U.S. officials say the Syrian military planes that dropped the chemicals had taken off

Putin said the missile strikes broke international law and has halted an agreement with the US aimed at avoiding clashes between their forces in the skies over Syria. 

The Russian leader regarded the U.S. action as 'aggression against a sovereign nation' on a 'made-up pretext' and as a cynical attempt to distract the world from civilian deaths in Iraq, Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov was cited as saying. 

'We call upon the UN Security Council to hold an extraordinary meeting to discuss the situation,' the foreign ministry in Moscow said in a statement, calling the strike a 'gross... violation of international law.'

Two U.S. warships fired 59 cruise missiles from the eastern Mediterranean Sea at the Syrian airbase controlled by forces of President Bashar al-Assad in response to a poison gas attack in a rebel-held area on Tuesday, US officials said.

Facing his biggest foreign policy crisis since his January 20 inauguration, President Donald Trump took the toughest direct US action yet in Syria's six-year-old civil war, raising the risk of confrontation with Russia and Iran, Assad's two main military backers. 

'Years of previous attempts at changing Assad's behaviour have all failed and failed very dramatically,' Trump said as he announced the attack from his Florida resort, Mar-a-Lago, where he was meeting Chinese President Xi Jinping.

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About 60 of theses US Tomahawk missiles launched early Friday hit the Shayrat air base, southeast of the city of Homs, a small installation with two runways

The Kremlin claimed that the Syrian armed forces do not possess chemical weapons, saying this has been confirmed by Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) .

'The fact of the destruction of all chemical weapons stockpiles has been recorded and confirmed by the OPCW, a specialized UN unit,' said Peskov.

'At the same time, in Putin's opinion, total disregard for the use of chemical weapons by terrorists only drastically aggravates the situation.'

He said: 'Putin also sees the attacks on Syria by the US as an attempt to divert the international community's attention from the numerous casualties among civilians in Iraq.'

The spokesman warned: 'This move by Washington is causing substantial damage to Russian-US relations, which are in tatters as it is.' 

The Tomahawk missiles were launched from the USS Porter and USS Ross around 8:40 p.m. EDT (0040 GMT on Friday), striking multiple targets - including the airstrip, aircraft and fuel stations - on the Shayrat Air Base, which the Pentagon says was used to store chemical weapons.

'Initial indications are that this strike has severely damaged or destroyed Syrian aircraft and support infrastructure and equipment at Shayrat Airfield, reducing the Syrian government's ability to deliver chemical weapons,' said Pentagon spokesman Captain Jeff Davis.

At least four Syrian soldiers, including a senior officer, were killed in the attack, which almost completely destroyed the base, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Russia's foreign minister Sergey Lavrov says no Russian servicemen have been hurt.  

Lavrov, speaking on a trip to Uzbekistan, strongly condemned the U.S. strike saying it violates international law.

Russian state TV aired footage showing the damage from the U.S. strikes at the Syrian air base. It showed craters and pockmarks left by explosions and said that nine Syrian air force jets have been destroyed in the attack.

The U.S. cruise missile attack was a 'one-off,' a U.S. defense official told Reuters, meaning it was expected to be a single strike with no current plans for escalation.

A communication link between the U.S. and Russia used to protect their pilots flying sorties over Syria was used ahead of an American missile strike on the country.

The so-called 'deconfliction line' is operated by the U.S. military's Central Command at the sprawling al-Udeid Air Base in Qatar. It serves as a crucial link to make sure the increasingly crowded Syrian airspace doesn't see any accidental collisions or attacks on each other.

Smoke could be seen rising from the Homs airbase targeted by US missile strikes. The military action has already sparked a furious response from President Vladimir Putin, who this morning called the airstrikes an 'illegal act of aggression'

Syrian military says the U.S. missile attack on one of its air bases in central Syria has killed six and caused extensive damage, calling it an aggression that undermines Damascus' counter terrorism operations. An ambulance is pictured at the scene this morning

Pentagon spokesman Capt. Jeff Davis says: 'U.S. military planners took precautions to minimize risk to Russian or Syrian personnel located at the airfield' targeted in Syria's Homs province. U.S. Central Command did not immediately respond to an Associated Press query on specifics of how the line was used. 

Syrian state TV said that 'American aggression' had targeted a Syrian military base with 'a number of missiles and cited a Syrian military source as saying the strike had 'led to losses.'

Trump sought to cast the attack, which took place as he and Xi were wrapping up a dinner of Dover sole and dry-aged New York strip steak, as an effort to deter Syria from using chemical weapons in the future.

'Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad launched a horrible chemical weapons attack on innocent civilians,' he said later. 'Tonight I ordered a targeted military strike on the airfield in Syria from where the chemical attack was launched.'

'It is in this vital national security interest of the United States to prevent and deter the spread and use of deadly chemical weapons,' Trump added.

Trump aides described his action as a measured and targeted response and suggested the wider U.S. strategy, which has been to avoid getting dragged into the civil war, would not change.

Trump ordered the strikes a day after he blamed Assad (left with Putin in 2015) for this week's chemical attack, which killed at least 70 people, many of them children, in the Syrian town of Khan Sheikhoun. The Syrian government has denied it was behind the attack

'We feel the strike itself was proportionate,' U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson told reporters.

'This clearly indicates the president is willing to take decisive action when called for,' he added. 'I would not in any way attempt to extrapolate that to a change in our policy or our posture relative to our military activities in Syria today. There has been no change in that status.'

According to a U.S. defense official, Trump first asked about possible military action on Wednesday, after U.S. intelligence agencies confirmed that Syrian aircraft based at the al Shayrat airbase had dropped Sarin gas on civilians.

Planning began on Wednesday and accelerated at the Pentagon, the State Department and the White House on Thursday, helped by the fact that the Defense Department had numerous off-the-shelf plans, including for cruise missile strikes on Syrian airfields.

'It was a matter of dusting those off and adapting them for the current target set and timing,' the official told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity. 

The relatively quick response to the chemical attack came as Trump faced a growing list of global problems, from North Korea and China to Iran and Islamic State, and may have been intended to send a message to friends and foes alike of his resolve to use military force if deemed necessary.

Russia finally condemned the ghastly chemical weapons attack on Thursday despite being allied with Bashar al-Assad against Islamist rebels in Syria

Heartbreak: Disturbing footage shows Syrian father Abdul Hamid al-Yousef crying uncontrollably over the graves of his wife and two children who were killed in a suspected sarin gas attack this week

'One question is whether Russia will respond in any meaningful way,' said a senior U.S. official involved in planning the raid. 'If they do, they will be further complicit in the actions of the Syrian regime.'

Russia has air and ground forces in Syria after intervening there on Assad's side in 2015 and turning the tide against mostly Sunni Muslim rebel groups.

Trump has so far focused his Syria policy almost exclusively on defeating Islamic State militants in northern Syria, where U.S. special forces support Arab and Kurdish armed groups.

Iran, which also backs Assad, denounced the attack.

'Iran ... condemns use of chemical weapons ... but at the same time believes it is dangerous, destructive and violation of international laws to use it as an excuse to take unilateral actions,' Students News Agency ISNA quoted Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Qasemi as saying.

Israel welcomed the move.

'In both word and action, President Trump sent a strong and clear message today that the use and spread of chemical weapons will not be tolerated,' Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said in a statement.

U.S. lawmakers had a mixed reaction, with some criticizing Trump's decision to use force without getting their approval.

'Congress will work with the president, but his failure to seek congressional approval is unlawful,â said Senator Tim Kaine, the 2016 Democratic vice presidential candidate.

The U.N. Security Council was expected to hold closed-door consultations on Friday about the U.S. strike on Syria following a request by Bolivia, an elected member of the council, a senior Security Council diplomat said. 

TIMELINE OF THE SYRIAN CIVIL WAR AND US RESPONSE 

The U.S. attack on a Syrian air base came after years of heated debate and deliberation in Washington over intervention in the bloody civil war.

Chemical weapons have killed hundreds of people since the start of the conflict, with the U.N. blaming three attacks on the Syrian government and a fourth on the Islamic State group. One of the worst yet came Tuesday in rebel-held northern Idlib and killed dozens, including women and children.

That attack prompted President Donald Trump, on day 77 of his presidency, to dramatically shift U.S. policy, with the first direct U.S. attack on the Syrian government.

Trump blamed Syrian President Bashar Assad for the attack and called on the international community to join him in trying to end the bloodshed.

A timeline of events in Syria leading up to Tuesday's attack:

March 2011: Protests erupt in the city of Daraa over security forces' detention of a group of boys accused of painting anti-government graffiti on the walls of their school. On March 15, a protest is held in Damascus' Old City. On March 18, security forces open fire on a protest in Daraa, killing four people in what activists regard as the first deaths of the uprising. Demonstrations spread, as does the crackdown by President Bashar Assad's forces.

April 2011: Security forces raid a sit-in in Syria's third-largest city, Homs, where thousands of people tried to create the mood of Cairo's Tahrir Square, the epicenter of protests against Egypt's autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

Aug. 18, 2011: President Barack Obama calls on Assad to resign and orders Syrian government assets frozen.

Summer 2012: Fighting spreads to Aleppo, Syria's largest city and its former commercial capital.

August 20, 2012: Obama says the use of chemical weapons would be a 'red line' that would change his calculus on intervening in the civil war and have 'enormous consequences.'

March 19, 2013: The Syrian government and opposition trade accusations over a gas attack that killed some 26 people, including more than a dozen government soldiers, in the town of Khan al-Assal in northern Syria. A U.N. investigation later finds that sarin nerve gas was used, but does not identify a culprit.

August 21, 2013: Hundreds of people suffocate in rebel-held suburbs of the Syrian capital, with many suffering from convulsions, pinpoint pupils, and foaming at the mouth. U.N. investigators visit the sites and determine that ground-to-ground missiles loaded with sarin were fired on civilian areas while residents slept. The U.S. and others blame the Syrian government, the only party to the conflict known to have sarin gas.

Aug. 31, 2013: Obama says he will go to Congress for authorization to carry out punitive strikes against the Syrian government, but appears to lack the necessary support in the legislature.

Sept. 27, 2013: The U.N. Security Council orders Syria to account for and destroy its chemical weapons stockpile, following a surprise agreement between Washington and Moscow, averting U.S. strikes. The Security Council threatens to authorize the use of force in the event of non-compliance.

Oct. 14, 2013: Syria becomes a signatory to the Chemical Weapons Convention, prohibiting it from producing, stockpiling or using chemical weapons.

June 23, 2014: The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons says it has removed the last of the Syrian government's chemical weapons. Syrian opposition officials maintain that the government's stocks were not fully accounted for, and that it retained supplies.

Sept. 23, 2014: The U.S. launches airstrikes on Islamic State group targets in Syria.

Aug. 7, 2015: The U.N. Security Council authorizes the OPCW and U.N. investigators to probe reports of chemical weapons use in Syria, as reports circulate of repeated chlorine gas attacks by government forces against civilians in opposition-held areas. Chlorine gas, though not as toxic as nerve agents, can be classified as a chemical weapon depending on its use.

Aug. 24, 2016: The joint OPCW-U.N. panel determines the Syrian government twice used helicopters to deploy chlorine gas against its opponents, in civilian areas in the northern Idlib province. A later report holds the government responsible for a third attack. The attacks occurred in 2014 and 2015. The panel also finds that the Islamic State group used mustard gas.

Feb. 28, 2017: Russia, a stalwart ally of the Syrian government, and China veto a U.N. Security Council resolution authorizing sanctions against the Syrian government for chemical weapons use.

April 4, 2017: At least 58 people are killed in what doctors say could be a nerve gas attack on the town of Khan Sheikhoun in the rebel-held Idlib province. Victims show signs of suffocation, convulsions, foaming at the mouth and pupil constriction. Witnesses say the attack was carried out by either Russian or Syrian Sukhoi jets. Moscow and Damascus deny responsibility.

April 4, 2017: President Donald Trump issues a statement saying that the 'heinous' actions of Assad's government are the direct result of Obama administration's 'weakness and irresolution.'

April 5, 2017: Trump says Assad's government has 'crossed a lot of lines' with the suspected chemical attack in Syria.

April 6, 2017: The U.S. fired a barrage of cruise missiles into Syria Thursday night in retaliation for this week's gruesome chemical weapons attack against civilians, U.S. officials said. It was the first direct American assault on the Syrian government and Trump's most dramatic military order since becoming president. Trump said strike on Syria in the 'vital national security interest' of the United States.