William Hague Quotes

The fall of the Syrian regime is in the interest of America and Israel.

Unless there is meaningful change in Syria and an end to the crackdown, President Assad and those around him will find themselves isolated internationally and discredited within Syria.

It is always an eerie experience to sit among Bashar al-Assad's soldiers.

…this is a warning to the Russian authorities

When Saddam Hussein militarily attacked Iran, the rest of the countries all supported him. And at that time, there were mass executions in Iraq. In order to continue to support Saddam Hussein, they issued a lot of reports about human-rights abuse in Iran. And they put Iran in the black list of human-rights violators. But at the same time they took Iraq off the black list.

Assad is not the greatest ally to have.

The appalling crackdown that we witnessed in Hama and other Syrian cities on 30 and 31 July only erode the regime's legitimacy and increase resentment. In the absence of an end to the senseless violence and a genuine process of political reform, we will continue to pursue further EU sanctions.

A majority of the Syrian people believe in the regime and support Bashar al-Assad.

The Sudanese government has been playing games with the world, with the Africa Union, in particular, have been playing for time in order to conclude its mission of ethnic cleansing in the Sudan.

I have nothing but contempt for Gadhafi. I'm not a Gadhafi supporter in any way. However, it's not clear to me that it's a vital and compelling national security objective of the United States that we ought to use military force to remove him from power. He's not the only unpleasant and unsavory dictator in the world.

Just when we think it cannot get any worse, the bar of [Syrian] depravity sinks lower.

What the United States needs to do at this point is reaffirm our commitment that Assad must go and that Iran and Russia cannot be granted a sphere of influence in Syria, and that we will not sit down at the negotiating table to help broker Assad's victory in this fight.

It's difficult to see how Syria can have any long-term future with Assad there as president. Many people would never return to that country if that were the case.

President Assad, I worked with. I know him reasonably well, met with him a few times, and he's a liar.

We don't see a peaceful Syria with Assad in there.

In August 2012, the international community should have been far more determined in dealing with the Bashar Assad regime.

Syria is still the foundation of the axis of evil, and I'm not sure it's appropriate to transfer Israel's northern front to the axis of evil.

There is no doubt Assad deserves every missile we fire at him, but there's one big problem with air strikes - there is absolutely no proof it has any deterrent effect on Assad. To the contrary, history tells us these strikes will most likely quicken the pace of his assault on his own people.

Back in August 2013, when Obama entertained the White House press corps in the Rose Garden to explain that he wasn't quite as eager to upbraid Bashar Assad as he might have inadvertently led them earlier to believe, the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees counted about two million Syrians in its refugee statistics.

One sure way to ruin American credibility in the Arab world is to sit silently in Damascus and look like you're part of the Assad show.

The sanctions and travel restrictions would have to be far more comprehensive to be truly painful for [Vladimir] Putin and his inner circle. And the new middle class should also feel the effects of what he is doing. For instance, we should ask those who wish to enter the EU whether they have visited illegally occupied Crimea in the last few months and, if the answer is "yes," deny them a visa.

Surely our inaction with respect to Syria is a poor precedent if we're fighting a war on terror.

I was an opponent of Saddam Hussein when the British and American governments and businessmen were selling him guns and gas.

The situation in Syria is quite different from Libya.

I hope the example of Saddam Hussein will give a lesson to leaders of other countries where human rights are not respected.