Russian Lawmakers Call Off U.S. Trip After Congress Snub

WASHINGTON — Russian lawmakers have canceled plans to travel to the U.S to discuss the crisis in Syria with their U.S. counterparts after congressional leaders refused to see them, the Russian ambassador to Washington said Friday.
The Obama administration has been intensely lobbying Congress to authorize a U.S. military strike against Syria in response to the alleged use of chemical weapons by Syria's government in the country's civil war.
Presumably, the Russian lawmakers would have taken the opposite view and lobbied their U.S. counterparts against supporting U.S. military action in Syria, which Moscow opposes.

But the Russians, who first proposed the trip to Washington last week, decided against it after the leaders of the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate declined to get involved, Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak said.


SOURCE: REUTERS