NYT: Saudi Arabia Purchased great amount of Weapons from Croatia and Quietly Funneled Them to Armed Terrorists in Syria

American and Western officials have revealed that Saudi Arabia has financed a large purchase of weapons from Croatia and quietly funneled them to armed terrorist groups in Syria.

New York Times Newspaper quoted officials as saying that the weapons began reaching what it called as “rebels” in December via shipments shuttled through Jordan.

The newspaper indicated that Washington’s role in the weapons shipments, if any, is not clear, adding that officials in Europe and the United States cited the sensitivity of the shipments and declined to comment publicly.

But one senior American official described the shipments as a maturing of the logistical pipeline of the so-called “opposition”. The official noted that the “opposition” remains fragmented and operationally incoherent, adding that the recent Saudi purchase was “not in and of itself a tipping point.”

“I remain convinced we are not near that tipping point,” the official said.

Officials said that multiple planeloads of weapons have left Croatia since last December, when many Yugoslav weapons began to appear in videos posted by rebels on YouTube.

Officials familiar with the transfers said the arms were part of an undeclared surplus in Croatia remaining from the 1990s Balkan wars. One Western official said the shipments included “thousands of rifles and hundreds of machine guns” and an unknown quantity of ammunition.

Croatia’s Foreign Ministry and arms-export agency denied that such shipments had occurred, while Saudi and Jordanian officials rejected to comment on the issue.

The newspaper indicated that the Gulf States send military equipment and other assistance to the armed groups for more than a year, yet the difference in the recent shipments has been partly of scale.