WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama said on Thursday he reserved the right to resort to both diplomatic and military options to pressure Syrian President Bashar al-Assad but insisted that U.S. action alone would not be enough to resolve the Syrian crisis.

Taking a cautious line at a joint news conference with Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, Obama voiced hope that the United States and Russia would succeed in arranging an international peace conference on Syria, despite signs of growing obstacles.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Washington’s top tax official was fired on Wednesday as President Barack Obama sought to stem a rising tide of criticism over the Internal Revenue Service’s improper targeting of conservative groups for special scrutiny.

With three congressional probes of the IRS looming and Republicans’ calls for firings at the agency growing louder, Obama said he told Treasury Secretary Jack Lew to demand the resignation of Steven Miller, the acting IRS commissioner. Lew had done so, the president said.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Washington’s top tax official was fired on Wednesday as President Barack Obama sought to stem a rising tide of criticism in a scandal over the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of conservative groups for special scrutiny.

Seeking to regain the initiative amid a series of controversies that have threatened his second-term agenda, Obama said new leadership was needed to restore public confidence in the IRS, whose reputation for political independence has suffered a major blow.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Washington’s top tax official was fired on Wednesday as President Barack Obama sought to stem a rising tide of criticism in a scandal over the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of conservative groups for special scrutiny.

Seeking to regain the initiative amid a series of controversies that have threatened his second-term agenda, Obama said new leadership was needed to restore public confidence in the IRS, whose reputation for political independence has suffered a major blow.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Washington’s top tax official was fired on Wednesday as President Barack Obama sought to stem a rising tide of criticism over the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of conservative groups for special scrutiny.

Seeking to regain the initiative amid a series of controversies that have threatened his second-term agenda, Obama said new leadership was needed to restore public confidence in the IRS, whose reputation for political independence has suffered a major blow.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – As Republican lawmakers stepped up their calls for top Internal Revenue Service officials to resign, President Barack Obama planned to meet with Treasury officials on Wednesday to discuss how to respond to the growing uproar over the IRS’s targeting of conservative groups for extra scrutiny.

A day after a Treasury Department inspector general’s report that described how poor management led to an “inappropriate” focus on claims by conservative groups for tax-exempt status, several lawmakers set their sights on acting IRS Commissioner Steven Miller.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said on Tuesday he had ordered the FBI to open a criminal probe in a growing scandal over the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of conservative political groups for extra tax scrutiny.

Holder’s announcement came about four hours before an inspector general’s report on the IRS portrayed the tax agency as plagued by disarray and “insufficient oversight” during its struggles to review the cases of hundreds of advocacy groups that claimed they should be tax exempt.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Attorney General Eric Holder said on Tuesday he had ordered the FBI to open a criminal probe in a growing scandal over the Internal Revenue Service’s targeting of conservative political groups for extra tax scrutiny.

Holder announced the Justice Department investigation as the tax agency’s embattled acting commissioner, Steven Miller, traveled to Capitol Hill for meetings on the scandal amid Republican lawmakers’ calls for his resignation.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama vowed on Monday to work to bring the Syrian government and rebels to the negotiating table in coming weeks but warned that a “combustible mix” of regional meddling and Islamist militancy would make it hard to halt the country’s civil war.

Even as Obama backed a new joint U.S.-Russian effort to seek a diplomatic solution in Syria, he cited an array of obstacles to a credible peace process, including the involvement of Iran, the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah and the al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front in the two-year-old conflict.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Saying it was damaging to U.S. interests to keep holding prisoners in legal limbo at Guantanamo, President Barack Obama renewed an old vow on Tuesday to close the camp, where about 100 inmates are on hunger strike to protest against their years in detention without trial.

Human rights groups welcomed Obama’s recommitment to shutting the prison, but some activists called for action, not just words.