Obama gets little backing at G20 for strike against Syria

Leaders of the G20 group of influential economies remain divided over action against Syria as they enter the final day of their summit in St Petersburg today.

Italy's Prime Minister Enrico Letta said the splits were confirmed during a working dinner on Thursday.

Host nation Russia, a supporter of the Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria, is a prominent opponent of intervention over the chemical weapons attack that killed hundreds earlier this month.

A spokesman for the Russian presidency said a US strike on Syria would "drive another nail into the coffin of international law".

President Vladimir Putin's spokesman suggested the G20 is "split down the middle" over Syria. He said some countries were demanding "hasty action", while others stressed the importance of the UN Security Council.

At the United Nations, US ambassador Samantha Power accused Russia of holding the Security Council hostage by blocking resolutions. She went so far as to say that the UN Security Council was no longer a "viable path" for holding Syria accountable for war crimes.

Opponents of urgent military action appear to far outnumber supporters at the summit, according to a BBC report.

The US government accuses President Bashar Assad's forces of killing 1,429 people in a poison-gas attack in the Damascus suburbs on 21 August. It has been strongly backed by some European countries, particularly Britain and France.

However, the US and France are the only nations at the G20 summit to commit to using force in Syria. China and Russia insist any action without the UN would be illegal.

Power told a news conference in New York, "Even in the wake of the flagrant shattering of the international norm against chemical weapons use, Russia continues to hold the council hostage and shirk its international responsibilities.

"What we have learned, what the Syrian people have learned, is that the Security Council the world needs to deal with this crisis is not the Security Council we have."

US President Barack Obama is thought to be trying at the G20 summit to build an international coalition to back strikes against military targets in Syria.

But differences of opinion became obvious when world leaders - including Obama and Putin - discussed Syria over dinner on Thursday evening.

Italian Prime Minister Letta said in a tweet that "the G20 has just now finished the dinner session, at which the divisions about Syria were confirmed".

President Putin's press spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said after the dinner that the G20 was split down the middle, with some countries seeking ''hasty action'' and others wanting the US to go through the UN Security Council.

President Obama was nearly an hour late for Thursday's G20 dinner. His aides earlier said he had been trying to find time during the summit to call US members of Congress.

Formed in 1999, the "group of 20" comprises the 19 leading national economies, plus the EU.

The 2008 financial crisis and the rapid rise of China, India and Brazil has led the G20 to replace the G8 as the principal global economic forum

Leaders generally meet annually, with several other lower-level meetings each year