WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — US Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter is open to dialogue with Russia on the Syrian crisis, but it remains unclear whether an agreement on military cooperation in the country will be reached, US Department of Defense spokesperson Peter Cook said in a briefing on Thursday.
"He [Carter] supports what Secretary [of State John] Kerry is doing," Cook stated. "If the Russians are prepared to do the right thing in Syria, then this secretary of defense would be open to that conversation. We are not conducting or coordinating any military operations with Russia at this moment, and it is not clear we will ever reach an agreement to do so."
The US Department of Defense cannot confirm that Russian forces carried out the strikes along the Syria-Jordan border earlier this week that hit the moderate Syrian opposition.
"I cannot confirm with a 100 percent certainty that the Russians carried out those strikes," Cook stated. "Our understanding is these were strikes that did hit moderate opposition forces that had been fighting ISIL [Islamic State]."
