"My approval of the act does not constitute my adoption of the various statements of policy in the act as U.S. foreign policy," said Bush

WASHINGTON, December 13 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – U.S. President George W. Bush inked late Friday, December 12, a bill to impose economic and diplomatic sanctions on Syria over its alleged support for "terrorism" and "occupation" of Lebanese territories.

"Today, I have signed into law HR 1828, the 'Syria Accountability and Lebanese Sovereignty Restoration Act of 2003,'" Bush said in a statement released by the White House.

Approved beforehand by Congress, the new law gives the White House a range of options for sanctioning Syria, from restricting U.S. exports and business investment to downgrading Washington's diplomatic representation and imposing travel restrictions on Syrian diplomats in the U.S., reported the BBC News Online.

It further bans the exportation of "dual-use" technology, allows the U.S. government to freeze Syria's assets in the U.S. and restrict over-flight rights for Syrian aircraft inside American airspace.

The law, however, gives the U.S. president the option of waiving the sanctions in the interests of national security.

After inking the bill, Bush argued the new law would not influence the U.S. foreign policy.

"My approval of the act does not constitute my adoption of the various statements of policy in the act as U.S. foreign policy," he said in a statement.

Syria is on the U.S. State Department's list of "state sponsors of terrorism", along with North Korea, Sudan, Cuba, Iran and Libya, but is the only one of these countries to have full diplomatic relations with Washington.

Analysts believe that the sanctions would have greater political than economic impact as trade between the U.S. and Syria is only around $300m.

They said that the biggest losers could be American companies who have been recently contracted by Damascus to explore for oil.

Some Senators feared the law "could later be used to build a case for a military intervention against Syria".

While the law accuses Syria of "occupying" Lebanese territories, the Bush administration used its veto power to curtail U.N. draft resolutions condemning Israeli occupation of Arab territories for 26 times.

The last one was used on October 15 against a Syrian-proposed draft resolution condemning Israel's separation wall in the occupied Palestinian territories, under the yoke of Israeli occupation since 1948.

In June 1967, Israel occupied Al-Quds (Jerusalem) and the Syrian Golan Heights, a move condemned by the United Nations General Assembly.