M's snap White Sox's 9-game streak in 12 innings

By RICK GANO

AP Sports Writer

Associated Press Sports

updated 9:00 p.m. ET June 2, 2012

CHICAGO (AP) - After 12 innings and 4 hours, 16 minutes of baseball that featured 16 pitchers and eight homers, the Mariners finally ended Chicago's nine-game winning streak.

"This is one of those long games. It definitely makes it a lot better getting the win than the loss," said John Jaso, who doubled home the tiebreaking run in the 12th to help Seattle beat the White Sox 10-8 Saturday.

"They're a hot team. They showed it throughout today's game and yesterday's game - we get the lead and they come right back," he said. "That's what a hot team does. It's a good victory for us."

Ichiro Suzuki homered twice and Seattle's bullpen shut out the White Sox over the final four innings to end Chicago's longest winning streak since July 2010.

Tom Wilhelmsen (2-1) pitched three scoreless innings, allowing one hit, for the victory. Hisashi Iwakuma earned his second save by pitching the 12th, retiring Adam Dunn on a grounder with a runner on second to end it.

"Our bullpen came in and shut the door, and we were hitting one through nine," said Michael Saunders, who homered and had four hits.

On Friday night, Saunders dropped a fly ball in the eighth inning that led to three unearned runs and helped the White Sox to a 7-4 win. He was able to make up for it Saturday.

"The White Sox were really hot coming into this series and we lost a tough one last night," Saunders said. "It's easy to lose focus coming into a 12-inning game. When you give up a lead, it's easy to get down on yourselves. It's a hell of a win."

Jesus Montero led off the 10th with a double against Addison Reed (0-1). One out later, Jaso drove in pinch-runner Munenori Kawasaki. Chone Figgins followed with an RBI single.

Chicago's Dayan Viciedo tied the game with a two-out solo homer in the eighth off Stephen Pryor - the eighth home run of the game, four by each team.

"We did the right things, they just had a little more today. We had a chance to win it and just couldn't get it done," said Chicago's Gordon Beckham, who homered and had four RBIs.

The White Sox used nine pitchers - their bullpen was depleted by the end of the day - in an effort to keep their winning streak intact.

"It was unbelievable," Beckham said. " It was a long day. We used everybody. You hate to lose but when you don't have anybody else in the bullpen, it's one of those things. It is what it is."

The Mariners had rallied with three runs in the eighth off Jesse Crain for an 8-7 lead on Brendan Ryan's two-run double and an error on catcher A.J. Pierzynski, when his throw attempting to nab a stealing Ryan skipped past third and into left field.

Suzuki, just moved back to the leadoff spot Friday, hit two solo homers on a breezy, 73-degree day at U.S. Cellular Field.

In addition to Suzuki and Saunders, Justin Smoak also went deep off Chicago starter Gavin Floyd.

Pierzynski and Alex Rios also homered for first-place Chicago.

Beckham, who had a pair of homers in Friday night's series opener, hit a two-run shot to finish Seattle starter Hector Noesi after 4 1-3 innings and give the White Sox their first lead at 6-5. Beckham added an RBI infield single in the seventh for a two-run cushion.

Now that the streak is over, Chicago's goal is to keep playing the same brand of baseball.

"It has been nice. We've done a lot of good things. We plan on continuing," first-year manager Robin Ventura said.

"You can't win every game, but you know we are in every game, so that's the good news. We plan on being in games from here on out, too."

Suzuki homered to start the game, the 37th leadoff homer of his career. Smoak led off the second with another shot and then Suzuki went deep again leading off the third - the sixth multihomer game of his career.

Saunders hit Seattle's fourth homer of the game off Floyd, a two-run shot that made it 5-3 in the fourth.

Noesi allowed seven hits and six runs. Floyd yielded nine hits and five runs in five-plus innings and has given up 37 hits and 26 earned runs in his last 19 2-3 innings over four starts.

NOTES: Carlton Fisk, a Hall of Famer who caught for both the Red and White Sox, threw out the first pitch. Fisk said he was happy for Ventura when his former teammate got the manager's job in Chicago, although he was scratching his head when he first heard. "When he got the job, I was saying, `Why? What is the purpose? How did this come about?' And then my first time in here, I sat in Robin's office for 45 minutes ... and just talked about the whole process. It's pretty interesting the way it came about," Fisk said.

? 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Strasburg sharp vs. Braves

Stephen Strasburg pitched four-hit ball for seven sharp innings and Jesus Flores homered, leading the Washington Nationals over the Atlanta Braves 2-0 on Saturday.

Cabrera's 2 HRs lift Tigers past Yankees

DETROIT (AP) - Miguel Cabrera hit two prodigious homers and Omir Santos' sacrifice fly in the ninth inning gave the Detroit Tigers a wild 4-3 victory over the New York Yankees on Saturday night.

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Jobless rate now a leading political indicator

President Barack Obama speaks about jobs for veterans, Friday, June 1, 2012, at Honeywell Automation and Control Solutions Global Headquarters in Golden Valley, Minn. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)

President Barack Obama speaks about jobs for veterans, Friday, June 1, 2012, at Honeywell Automation and Control Solutions Global Headquarters in Golden Valley, Minn. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall)

This combination of Associated Press file photos shows from left, President Obama speaking at the TPI Composites Factory, a manufacturer of wind turbine blades on May 24, 2012, in Newton, Iowa, and Republican presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney speaking at the Solyndra manufacturing facility on May 31, 2012, in Fremont, Calif. The weak May unemployment report released Friday, June 1, 2012, presents President Barack Obama with a sobering reminder that his stewardship of a gradual recovery from the deepest recession since the Great Depression presents a tenuous argument for his re-election. However anemic job growth and an uptick in joblessness to 8.2 percent give new resonance to Republican presidential rival Mitt Romney's campaign. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall, Mary Altaffer. File)

President Barack Obama boards Air Force One, Friday, June 1, 2012, at Andrews Air Force Base, Md., en route to Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

Republican presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney holds a news conference outside the Solyndra manufacturing facility, Thursday, May 31, 2012, in Fremont, Calif. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)

GOLDEN VALLEY, Minn. (AP) ? The discouraging new unemployment numbers present President Barack Obama with a sobering reminder that an uneven recovery from the recession can be a fragile argument for his re-election. It's all deepening his anxiety over the political and economic threat posed by the European debt crisis.

Anemic job growth and an uptick in joblessness to 8.2 percent also give new resonance to Republican presidential rival Mitt Romney's campaign and put Obama on the defensive after a winter when the job trends were in his favor. Job growth now has been disappointing for three straight months, accentuating challenges ahead for the president.

Obama, speaking about the economy Friday in Minnesota, kept up an optimistic front. While he said the latest jobs report indicated that the economy was not growing fast enough, he predicted, "We will come back stronger; we do have better days ahead."

Romney called the figures "devastating news."

The Republican said in an interview Friday with CNBC that Obama's policies and his handling of the economy had "been dealt a harsh indictment."

Shortly after the report was released, Obama was in Minnesota to push his proposal to expand job opportunities for veterans and to raise money for his campaign. In the meantime, the world anxiously awaits the impact of the European debt crisis, which could stall the recovery in the U.S.

"What we're looking at is the longer-term trend," White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters traveling with Obama. The economy is still adding jobs, as it has for more than two years, Earnest said, "but it's readily apparent that we're not adding those jobs at a rapid enough pace."

The unemployment numbers, while imprecise and a typically lagging indicator of economic performance, are nevertheless an undeniable marker of the human cost of a weak economy.

May's 69,000 new jobs and downward adjustments for March and April mean the economy averaged just 73,000 jobs a month over the past two months. That's half of what's needed simply to keep up with population growth and is a dramatic drop from the 226,000 jobs created per month in the January-March quarter.

May's 8.2 percent jobless rate, the first increase in 11 months, reflects more people coming back into the job force, a thin silver lining to an otherwise dismal report

No president since the Great Depression has sought re-election with unemployment as high as that, and past incumbents have lost when the unemployment rate was on the rise.

Romney wants this presidential election to be a referendum on Obama's 3 1/2 years in office. Obama wants it to be a choice between two distinct visions for the country.

Obama is counting on an unemployment trajectory that has brought the rate from a high of 10 percent in October 2009. The president likes to point to the 3.8 million jobs created since he became president, though 12.5 million Americans remain unemployed. He highlights the resurgence of the auto industry following government bailouts of Chrysler and General Motors.

Friday's report seriously dampens Obama's message.

The United States has experienced periods of jobs slowdown for the past three years, only to bounce back. Last year, from May to August, job growth averaged 80,000 a month and from June through September of 2010, the average was 76,000. But Obama can't afford a prolonged period of feeble growth.

What's more, this downturn comes at a time of elevated worry over the eurozone's debt and economic crises. The issue has consumed Obama's time. It was the central subject at an economic summit with major powers at Camp David last month and took up most of the time in a secure conference call this week among Obama and the leaders of Germany, France and Italy.

Obama is pushing Congress to enact several proposals designed to spur job growth and secure the housing industry. "Congress has a responsibility here," Earnest said.

At the same time, his campaign has mounted a step-by-step assault on Romney's economic record, from his days as a venture capitalist to his tenure as Massachusetts governor from 2003-2007.

The Obama campaign released a new online video Friday that features several of Romney's former Republican political foes, including Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich, criticizing Romney's economic record.

The campaign also said it would hold a series of conference calls with reporters to discuss Romney's "failure to fulfill the economic promises he made" when he was running for governor of Massachusetts.

Romney, now freed from his primary contests, has aimed heavily at Obama's economic policies, arguing that they have slowed the recovery, not aided it. The Republican has emphasized his background in private business to argue that he's qualified to lead a nation in economic turmoil.

On Friday, his campaign released a new television ad promising "a better day" and declaring that a Romney presidency would focus from the start on the economy and the deficit, unleash U.S. energy resources and stand up to China on trade.

"President Romney's leadership puts jobs first," the ad states.

Obama could face the highest unemployment rate on Election Day of any president since Franklin Delano Roosevelt. But his aides argue that the trend line is more important than the actual number. Jimmy Carter lost his re-election bid in 1980 to Ronald Reagan as unemployment climbed from 6 percent to 7.5 percent. George H.W. Bush lost to Bill Clinton in 1992 as unemployment rose from 6.9 percent to 7.6 percent.

But while Reagan faced unemployment of 7.4 percent in October 1984, the rate had been dropping since the spring of 1983. He went on to win re-election.

Obama can find some solace in unemployment rates that have dropped sharply in several swing states. But those numbers can be deceiving and an employed voter is not necessarily an Obama voter.

A May Associated Press-GfK poll showed that 52 percent of those surveyed disapproved of Obama's handling of the economy while 46 percent approved.

___

Obama campaign video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sB7vuo2piak

Associated Press

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Lovely Little Snippets: {Winner Announced} My Memories ...

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Marketing Your Business Online ? My Perspective

If you are not already marketing your business online, it is time to start. Although there are a few exceptions, just about every business can benefit from online marketing. There are just so many advantages to this type of marketing. First of all, it is extremely affordable to market your business online. Other advantages to marketing your business online include the ability to reach a large target audience, the ability to reach potential customers all over the world and the ability to customize the marketing for different sectors of the target audience.

The affordability of Internet marketing is one of many reasons why many business owners are turning to the Internet for advertising. Advertising online is incredibly affordable especially when you consider how many potential customers a business owner can reach with an online marketing campaign. Most methods of online advertising are quite affordable and some of them do not have any direct costs. For example, you may choose to market your business online by participating in industry forums and posting links to your website whenever it is appropriate to do so. In this case the cost of creating and maintaining the website is insignificant in comparison to the number of potential clients you could reach through online marketing. Additionally, the costs associated with posting links to your website are incidental. You could consider the cost of having access to the Internet as part of the cost but you most likely require Internet access for other reasons as well so it is completely worthwhile.

Reaching a large target audience is another very worthwhile reason for marketing your business online. You may have spent a great deal of time and energy doing market research and determine who your target audience is. You may have also spent a great deal of time trying to figure out the best way to reach this audience. This is a very sound marketing principle but as it applies to marketing on local television, radio and print media it only allows you to reach a limited audience. However, when you take your marketing to the Internet you automatically drastically increase your potential target audience because you now have the ability to reach members of your target audience around the world.

This ability to reach customers around the world is another major advantage to marketing yourbusiness online. Regardless of where you live and operate your business, you have the ability to reach those who have an interest in the products you sell or the services you provide no matter where they live. This makes it possible for you to do business with customers around the world.

Likewise the fact that the Internet is available 24 hours a day is also very beneficial to those who choose to market their products or services online. Shopping for products and services in person can be very difficult especially for individuals who work long hours or those who work unusual hours. These working conditions make it difficult for these individuals to do business and make purchases of products and services they need during regular business hours. However, business owners who have an online presence are much more convenient because unlike stores and calling centers, the website never closes. This convenience gives potential customers the ability to view products and services, compare these products and service to the ones offered by competitors and make a purchase at any hour of any day.

If you are a business owner who is reading this article and you do not already have a strong online presence, you need to immediately start learning more about the world of Internet marketing. This is so important because if your competitors are marketing online, you may find they are gaining a steady advantage and are becoming more appealing to potential customers. Before too many of your potential customers become loyal customers of the competition it is time to start figuring out how you can market your business online and keep up with the competition.

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Graphic napalm photo from Vietnam War turns 40

TRANG BANG, Vietnam (AP) ? In the picture, the girl will always be 9 years old and wailing "Too hot! Too hot!" as she runs down the road away from her burning Vietnamese village.

She will always be naked after blobs of sticky napalm melted through her clothes and layers of skin like jellied lava.

She will always be a victim without a name.

It only took a second for Associated Press photographer Huynh Cong "Nick" Ut to snap the iconic black-and-white image 40 years ago. It communicated the horrors of the Vietnam War in a way words could never describe, helping to end one of the most divisive wars in American history.

But beneath the photo lies a lesser-known story. It's the tale of a dying child brought together by chance with a young photographer. A moment captured in the chaos of war that would be both her savior and her curse on a journey to understand life's plan for her.

"I really wanted to escape from that little girl," says Kim Phuc, now 49. "But it seems to me that the picture didn't let me go."

____

It was June 8, 1972, when Phuc heard the soldier's scream: "We have to run out of this place! They will bomb here, and we will be dead!"

Seconds later, she saw the tails of yellow and purple smoke bombs curling around the Cao Dai temple where her family had sheltered for three days, as north and south Vietnamese forces fought for control of their village.

The little girl heard a roar overhead and twisted her neck to look up. As the South Vietnamese Skyraider plane grew fatter and louder, it swooped down toward her, dropping canisters like tumbling eggs flipping end over end.

"Ba-boom! Ba-boom!"

The ground rocked. Then the heat of a hundred furnaces exploded as orange flames spit in all directions.

Fire danced up Phuc's left arm. The threads of her cotton clothes evaporated on contact. Trees became angry torches. Searing pain bit through skin and muscle.

"I will be ugly, and I'm not normal anymore," she thought, as her right hand brushed furiously across her blistering arm. "People will see me in a different way."

In shock, she sprinted down Highway 1 behind her older brother. She didn't see the foreign journalists gathered as she ran toward them, screaming.

Then, she lost consciousness.

___

Ut, the 21-year-old Vietnamese photographer who took the picture, drove Phuc to a small hospital. There, he was told the child was too far gone to help. But he flashed his American press badge, demanded that doctors treat the girl and left assured that she would not be forgotten.

"I cried when I saw her running," said Ut, whose older brother was killed on assignment with the AP in the southern Mekong Delta. "If I don't help her ? if something happened and she died ? I think I'd kill myself after that."

Back at the office in what was then U.S.-backed Saigon, he developed his film. When the image of the naked little girl emerged, everyone feared it would be rejected because of the news agency's strict policy against nudity.

But veteran Vietnam photo editor Horst Faas took one look and knew it was a shot made to break the rules. He argued the photo's news value far outweighed any other concerns, and he won.

A couple of days after the image shocked the world, another journalist found out the little girl had somehow survived the attack. Christopher Wain, a correspondent for the British Independent Television Network who had given Phuc water from his canteen and drizzled it down her burning back at the scene, fought to have her transferred to the American-run Barsky unit. It was the only facility in Saigon equipped to deal with her severe injuries.

"I had no idea where I was or what happened to me," she said. "I woke up and I was in the hospital with so much pain, and then the nurses were around me. I woke up with a terrible fear."

Thirty percent of Phuc's tiny body was scorched raw by third-degree burns, though her face somehow remained untouched. Over time, her melted flesh began to heal.

"Every morning at 8 o'clock, the nurses put me in the burn bath to cut all my dead skin off," she said. "I just cried and when I could not stand it any longer, I just passed out."

After multiple skin grafts and surgeries, Phuc was finally allowed to leave, 13 months after the bombing. She had seen Ut's photo, which by then had won the Pulitzer Prize, but she was still unaware of its reach and power.

She just wanted to go home and be a child again.

___

For a while, life did go somewhat back to normal. The photo was famous, but Phuc largely remained unknown except to those living in her tiny village near the Cambodian border. Ut and a few other journalists sometimes visited her, but that stopped after northern communist forces seized control of South Vietnam on April 30, 1975, ending the war.

Life under the new regime became tough. Medical treatment and painkillers were expensive and hard to find for the teenager, who still suffered extreme headaches and pain.

She worked hard and was accepted into medical school to pursue her dream of becoming a doctor. But all that ended once the new communist leaders realized the propaganda value of the 'napalm girl' in the photo.

She was forced to quit college and return to her home province, where she was trotted out to meet foreign journalists. The visits were monitored and controlled, her words scripted. She smiled and played her role, but the rage inside began to build and consume her.

"I wanted to escape that picture," she said. "I got burned by napalm, and I became a victim of war ... but growing up then, I became another kind of victim."

She turned to Cao Dai, her Vietnamese religion, for answers. But they didn't come.

"My heart was exactly like a black coffee cup," she said. "I wished I died in that attack with my cousin, with my south Vietnamese soldiers. I wish I died at that time so I won't suffer like that anymore ... it was so hard for me to carry all that burden with that hatred, with that anger and bitterness."

One day, while visiting a library, Phuc found a Bible. For the first time, she started believing her life had a plan.

Then suddenly, once again, the photo that had given her unwanted fame brought opportunity.

She traveled to West Germany in 1982 for medical care with the help of a foreign journalist. Later, Vietnam's prime minister, also touched by her story, made arrangements for her to study in Cuba.

She was finally free from the minders and reporters hounding her at home, but her life was far from normal. Ut, then working at the AP in Los Angeles, traveled to meet her in 1989, but they never had a moment alone. There was no way for him to know she desperately wanted his help again.

"I knew in my dream that one day Uncle Ut could help me to have freedom," said Phuc, referring to him by an affectionate Vietnamese term. "But I was in Cuba. I was really disappointed because I couldn't contact with him. I couldn't do anything."

___

While at school, Phuc met a young Vietnamese man. She had never believed anyone would ever want her because of the ugly patchwork of scars that banded across her back and pitted her arm, but Bui Huy Toan seemed to love her more because of them.

The two decided to marry in 1992 and honeymoon in Moscow. On the flight back to Cuba, the newlyweds defected during a refueling stop in Canada. She was free.

Phuc contacted Ut to share the news, and he encouraged her to tell her story to the world. But she was done giving interviews and posing for photos.

"I have a husband and a new life and want to be normal like everyone else," she said.

The media eventually found Phuc living near Toronto, and she decided she needed to take control of her story. A book was written in 1999 and a documentary came out, at last the way she wanted it told. She was asked to become a U.N. Goodwill Ambassador to help victims of war. She and Ut have since reunited many times to tell their story, even traveling to London to meet the Queen.

"Today, I'm so happy I helped Kim," said Ut, who still works for AP and recently returned to Trang Bang village. "I call her my daughter."

After four decades, Phuc, now a mother of two sons, can finally look at the picture of herself running naked and understand why it remains so powerful. It had saved her, tested her and ultimately freed her.

"Most of the people, they know my picture but there's very few that know about my life," she said. "I'm so thankful that ... I can accept the picture as a powerful gift. Then it is my choice. Then I can work with it for peace."

___

Online:

http://www.kimfoundation.com

___

Follow Margie Mason at http://www.twitter.com/margiemasonap

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Iran's sanction-beating grain trade seen ready to help Syria

LONDON/PARIS (Reuters) - Iran is poised to offer the Syrian authorities a short-term food lifeline with vital grains purchases as Western sanctions and mounting violence deter trade houses from doing deals with Damascus, international traders say.

Both are targets of Western sanctions that, while not intended to disrupt food imports, have hurt shipments of all kinds by complicating financial transactions. Richer and more practiced in the ways of sidestepping such embargoes, Iran seems set to help its struggling ally, though its own means are limited.

"Iran will try to help Syria," said a senior trader at a major international grain house in France who likened Tehran's interest in helping Syrian President Bashar al-Assad stave off food shortages to Algerian state aid last year for Tunisian and Libyan autocrats who were trying to stifle popular unrest.

"I think most of it will be done via the black market," the trader added, meaning that bread wheat, animal feed and other grains could be shipped to Syria by Iran discreetly, avoiding the normal practice of international public tenders.

Numerous sources in European grain trading centers and the Middle East concurred that Iran, a major energy exporter which has been under Western sanctions for years due to a dispute over its nuclear program, would help Assad, a key Arab ally whose government has been hit with Western and Arab League bans on banking and other dealings due to its crackdown on protests.

"It's a given that Iran will help Syria," said another grains dealer in western Europe, speaking on condition of anonymity, as is common in the business. "But it won't be on the radar. It will be a bilateral agreement between them."

Grains traders said Iran, which buys its supplies through public tenders and in private deals, would also aim to help Damascus by turning a blind eye to its own private merchants re-selling wheat to Syria.

Government agencies usually buy through public tenders where the quantity required, shipment schedule and other details are sent to international trade houses with a deadline for bids. Purchases by the private sector are generally less visible.

Separated by a land border, some of the ways Iran could get supplies to Syria would be on trucks via Iraq or Turkey, which have borders with Syria. Separately, shipments could be re-routed through Iraqi or Turkish ports and then onto Syria, European and Middle East grain traders say.

Unable to finance the big international grain purchases it has been used to, Syria has engaged in a desperate search for grain that has forced Damascus into an array of unusually small deals, many arranged by middlemen around the Middle East and Asia.

But the amounts agreed have been nowhere near meeting Syria's reliance on imports for about half of its annual needs of 7-8 million metric tons (7.7-8.8 million tons) of grain, a situation that threatens to sap domestic support for Assad as he faces mounting international condemnation and domestic defiance of his rule.

Tehran, under pressure itself for refusing demands from world powers to stop enriching uranium they see as part of a secret nuclear weapons program, has experience that can help an ally in the regional confrontation which pits Shi'ite Muslim, non-Arab Iran against the Sunni-dominated Arab states.

"Iran's relative success in circumventing sanctions, which have complicated efforts to import grains and other basic food staples, derives from its ability to find alternative ways to pay for imports," said Torbjorn Soltvedt, senior analyst at risk analysis firm Maplecroft in London.

Iran, unlike Syria, is increasingly working around the restrictions using covert payment systems including non-dollar currencies and its oil and gold in exchange for goods.

However, even Iran, needing to feed its 78 million people, has limited resources to help Assad, whose Alawite minority, religiously tied to Shi'ite Islam, has dominated Syria for four decades, even though most of its 23 million people are Sunnis.

"Although Tehran is likely to continue to provide financial and logistical support to Damascus, domestic food security concerns may limit the degree to which it will be able to meet a significant shortfall in the supply of grain and basic food staples in Syria," said Maplecroft's Soltvedt.

A trader based in the Middle East said Syria was most likely to benefit from profit-driven private traders in Iran rather than from direct aid from the Tehran government: "Iran has to continue to sort out its own food problems, so any assistance to Syria is not viable by the government," the trader said.

"It could become a private trade brokered by Iranian middle men," he added.

Traders involved in the supply of grains to the region say the coming harvests in Syria and Iran may also help the Syrians for a short period, though its food requirements remained critical.

"Syria's crop is coming in and this will take some of the immediate pressure off the government," said one trader in Hamburg, a key grain trading centre in Europe.

"The United Nations aid agencies are also doing big buying of Syrian aid cargoes, so the Syrian government may be happy to let the international aid agencies foot a large part of their food bill."

TURKISH INTERVENTION

Turkey was also likely to remain as an intermediary for both Iran and Syria, traders said. In recent days there have been grain deliveries to Syria via the Turkish port of Mersin, while Turkish banks have been used for Iranian and Syrian deals.

Turkey, exasperated by its one-time ally Assad, announced late last year its own sanctions targeting the Syrian government. But it specifically said it would avoid measures that would add to the hardships of the Syrian people.

"Turkey will remain the key factor for the Iranians and they still look like they are keeping lines open," one trader in western Europe said. "So bringing in supplies from Turkey is a viable option for Iran."

Syria has few options but to look for unconventional supply routes:

"I do not know anyone who is prepared to offer to the Syrians," another grain trader in France said. "For us it is an internal decision that is not only related to financing problems and risks of shipping but a way to put pressure to stop the atrocities in that country."

State currency reserves have been depleted and the Syrian pound has lost nearly half its value, adding to import problems.

The worsening trade environment has already hit Syrian container ship volumes, which account for household products such as canned food and clothing.

"There is a huge mess all over Syria today so how can you make sure your vessel will arrive and discharge safely with no problems, no demurrage (extra costs), let alone not being damaged by fighting?" the Middle East grain trader said.

"These are considerations facing most shipowners and will deter business now."

(Additional reporting by Michael Hogan in Hamburg, Maha El Dahan in Abu Dhabi, Gus Trompiz in Paris, Sarah McFarlane, Nigel Hunt and Veronica Brown in London, writing by Jonathan Saul and Veronica Brown; Editing by Janet McBride)

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Does working the night shift cause breast cancer?

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