The Truth About Syria

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(Reuters) - Iran has launched its latest diplomatic initiative to resolve the intensifying conflict in Syria, warning that the abrupt fall of president Bashar al-Assad would have catastrophic consequences for the country.

At least 12 nations with “a correct and realistic position” would attend a meeting on Thursday in Tehran to discuss the conflict, a senior Iranian diplomat said this week, indicating that no nation that backs the opposition and calls for Assad to leave power would be present.

Russia - which along with Iran has strongly supported Assad since the crisis erupted 17 months ago - has said it will attend the meeting at ambassadorial level but it was unclear which other key players would be present.

Iranian media has reported that China would also be present, along with Algeria, Tajikistan, Venezuela, Pakistan, India and six members of the Arab League but there was no independent confirmation.

In an opinion piece published by the Washington Post on Wednesday, Iranian foreign minister Ali Akbar Salehi warned that the fall of Assad would catastrophic consequences for the countries.

“Syrian society is a beautiful mosaic of ethnicities, faiths and cultures, and it will be smashed to pieces should President Bashar al-Assad abruptly fall,” it read.

While Salehi said Iran sought a solution that was in “everyone’s interest”, Western diplomats have dismissed the conference as an attempt to divert attention away from bloody events on the ground and to preserve the rule of Assad.

“The Islamic Republic’s support for Assad’s regime is hardly compatible with a genuine attempt at conciliation between the parties,” said one Western diplomat based in Tehran.

It showed Iran was “running out of ideas”, he added. Another Western diplomat said Tehran was trying to broaden the support base of the Syrian leader.

Along with Russia and China, Iran has strongly supported Assad whose forces have launched crushing operations against anti-government protesters and armed opposition groups since the crisis erupted 17 months ago.

The Islamic Republic has resisted an agreement on Syria that requires Assad to quit as part of any political transition. There is no sign that Tehran is ready to adopt a new approach, despite setbacks for Assad including the defection this week of his prime minister.

But analysts say the recent signs of cracks in the Syrian leadership have taken Iran by surprise.

“Iran is trying to show strength and regional presence, but if they were going to make a big play why not do it at the Non-Aligned Movement summit (taking place in Tehran in late August)?” said Scott Lucas of the EA Worldview news website that specialises in covering Iran.

“They seem to be so jittery about Syria, they couldn’t afford to wait,” he added.

ACCUSATIONS

Iran’s Shi’ite rulers have accused Western and Arab nations - specifically Sunni-ruled Saudi Arabia - of fomenting terrorism in Syria by arming opposition groups.

In turn, Syria’s mostly Sunni Muslim rebels accuse Tehran of sending military personnel to Syria and of providing light arms, as well as tactical and communications expertise to Syrian government forces.

The crisis has soured Iran’s relations with neighbouring Turkey which has hosted opposition meetings, extended assistance to Syrian refugees and demanded Assad leave office.

“Iran wants to co-ordinate efforts among countries that don’t accept the Western and Saudi approach to Syria,” said Mohammad Marandi of Tehran University. “It’s a counter-force to the so-called Friends of Syria gathering.”

Iranian involvement in the crisis has been complicated by the seizure by rebels of 48 Iranians in Syria on Saturday on suspicion of being military personnel. Tehran has said they were pilgrims, but acknowledged that some of the men were retired soldiers or Revolutionary Guards.

Iranian officials have engaged in intensive diplomatic efforts in the region this week.

On Tuesday, while Foreign Minister Salehi was in Ankara trying to maintain relations, the head of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council Saeed Jalili was in Damascus to reassure Assad of Tehran’s support.

“They’re in chaos in terms of the bureaucracy. There have been lots of statements but no-one’s co-ordinating it,” said EA Worldview’s Scott Lucas.

The meeting comes just days before a meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation set to focus on Syria. In recent days Iran has warned the Muslim world of the threat posed to it by the United States.

“In the new plan that the Americans have provided for the Middle East, they have foreseen changes for all countries,” Iran’s state news agency quoted Ahmadinejad as saying on Wednesday.

“I am certain they have plans for changes in Saudi Arabia as well … they do not want Muslim countries to have power and in opposition we must stand together more than before,” he added.

(Reporting by Marcus George; Additional reporting by Yeganeh Torbati, editing by Rosalind Russell)

A drone was shot down in Homs in February. The version given by Christophe Ayad from Le Monde is of course that of a Syrian missile purchased from Iran that was destroyed by the rebels. While the journalist acknowledges that Israeli and U.S. drones are monitoring the region, he dismisses Syria’s ability to shoot them.

• In total disconnect from the Russian press, Le Figaro’s Barluet Alain believes that Russia is annoyed with Syria’s intransigence. It’s been a recurrent mantra for months to announce a possible Russian desertion of Syria. As if Moscow were embarrassed by the Syrian crackdown when Moscow has kept repeating that there is no political repression in Syria, but a foreign military interference.

• The French Catholic daily La Croix dedicates a cover story on Syria with not even a line on the massacres of Christians by the rebels and the confiscation of their property by the Free “Syrian” Army.

• The Irish Times observes that the military drift of Syrian dissent has gradually cut it off from the population, pushing it into a corner. Junge Welt, the only anti-imperialist daily in Western Europe, welcomes this development which turned out to be a triumph for the al-Assad government, as shown by the events of 15 March.

• Maria Golovnina raves in The Scotsman about Rami Abdulrahman’s actions, a Coventry shopkeeper who, together with a friend, runs the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Two persons alone, without any logistical support but with many contacts in Syria, managed last year on a daily basis to inform the Western press on the crimes committed by the Syrian government. However, the reporter forgot to ask the London shopkeeper how he could know what was happening in Syria better than the Observer Mission deployed by the Arag League throughout the entire country for a whole month.

• A staunch supporter of the war, the neoconservative Max Boot derides the Pentagon’s dithering on Syria. In theWashington Post, he explains that the Defense Department’s fear that a military intervention may plunge Syria into a civil war makes no sense, since it is already there.

• Jonathan Spyer in the Jerusalem Post points out that in a matter of a few days the Syrian national army regained control of the rebel strongholds (Homs, Idlib, Deraa). But now matter how decisive, this military victory will not be enough for the fire is still smoldering and will light up again.

• According to the FAO, as reported by the Times of Oman, 1.4 million Syrians are likely to be caught up in a food crisis.

• The Khaleej Times reproduced an op-ed by John Podesta and Ken Guide. The coordinators of President Obama’s think tank stressed that the Libyan war has revealed the limits of European armies. The Syrian issue brings to the fore the urgency of a NATO reform and an increase in European military budgets.

Cartoons of the day

© The National

A year later, the rebels are completely surrounded by tanks. The National shows that the rebellion continues, but with no prospect. Paradoxically, the UAE daily recognizes at the same time that the military does not seek to crackdown on the opposition, but to contain it.

The Saudi Gazette implies that Kofi Annan can not believe Assad when he claims that all is well: Syria is painted with blood. On the contrary, the problem is that Kofi Annan appeared to be satisfied with his first contacts with the Syrian president, while being disappointed by the latter’s distrust.

By Tom Miles

GENEVA (Reuters) - Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is battling al Qaeda-backed “terrorists” including at least 15,000 foreign fighters who will seize towns across Syria if government troops withdraw, a Russian diplomat said on Thursday.

Russia is a staunch defender of Syria despite international condemnation of the crackdown by Assad’s forces and evidence of human rights abuses against unarmed civilians.

Addressing a one-day humanitarian forum on Syria at the United Nations in Geneva, Russia’s deputy ambassador Mikhail Lebedev said rebels had recently committed large-scale attacks against Syrian infrastructure, including schools and hospitals.

“Rebel groups attack, kill, torture and intimidate the civilian population. The flow of all kind of terrorists from some neighbouring countries is always increasing,” Lebedev told the forum.

Asked by Reuters how many foreign fighters were believed to be in Syria, he said: “How many got in through illegal routes? The border there is not demarcated, not delimited, so nobody knows. But at least 15,000.”

On Thursday, Kofi Annan, the U.N.-Arab League envoy to Syria, said he would urge Assad and his foes to stop fighting and seek a political solution, drawing angry rebukes from dissidents.

Russia wants a ceasefire by all parties and an inclusive political dialogue. Lebedev told the U.N. meeting criticism of Assad was overdone.

“We urge our partners not to yield to temptation to exaggerate things but to expedite a balanced and professional approach to delivering help to all segments of the Syrian population with no exception,” he said.

“Most of the militants are indeed directly or closely affiliated with al Qaeda.”

COUNTERPRODUCTIVE

Lebedev told Reuters the information about al Qaeda links in Syria was an “unambiguous fact” but declined to say if Russia would provide the U.N. with evidence to back its allegation Syrian rebels were committing torture.

“All I know is that all the way through (the wars in the Russian region of) Chechnya nobody believed us when we said the Islamic underground, including terrorist organisations, was developing its operations on our soil,” he said.

“It’s just that five years later there’s a recognition that we did everything right.”

Lebedev said attempts to force Assad to rein in his troops unilaterally would be counterproductive.

“If we demand that the Syrian government withdraw its forces from the cities without addressing the same call to the opposition we should be ready (to see) that the relevant towns will immediately be occupied by the violent armed groups,” he said.

(Reporting by Tom Miles; Editing by Sophie Hares)

Russia can’t support a new US draft resolution on Syria, the country’s Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov stated in Moscow. He said that the document is not balanced enough and lacks calls for all parties to the conflict to stop violence.

The US has worked out the package recently. It envisages nonviolence by Syria’s government, free access of aid to the country and calls to stop human rights violations, to free imprisoned oppositionists and to withdraw military vehicles from the cities.

Earlier, Moscow and Beijing vetoed a number of draft resolutions by the West in the Security Council as incomprehensive ones.

(Source: )

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Russia accused Libya during a U.N. Security Council meeting on Wednesday of running a training center for Syrian rebels and arming the fighters in their battle to overthrow the country’s President Bashar al-Assad.

“We have received information that in Libya, with the support of the authorities, there is a special training center for the Syrian revolutionaries and people are sent to Syria to attack the legal government,” Russia’s ambassador to the United Nations, Vitaly Churkin, told the U.N. Security Council.

“This is completely unacceptable … This activity is undermining stability in the Middle East,” said Churkin, who also questioned whether “the export of revolution” was “turning into the export of terrorism.”

In Syria, security forces have killed more than 7,500 civilians during an 11-month crackdown on pro-democracy protests, according to the United Nations, and the outside world has proved powerless to halt the killing. Russia and China have twice used vetoes to block action by the U.N. Security Council.

Pro-democracy protests in the region, dubbed the Arab Spring, have toppled leaders in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya.

Russia, which is Syria’s main arms supplier and has use of a naval base there, has also repeatedly voiced anger over NATO air strikes that helped Libyan rebels drive Muammar Gaddafi from power last year and on Wednesday Churkin demanded that NATO recognize it caused civilian casualties and pay compensation.

Rights groups have said several dozen civilians were killed by NATO air strikes in Libya.

While Libyan Prime Minister Abdurrahim El-Keib did not respond to Churkin’s accusation that Libya was training Syrian rebels, he told the U.N. Security Council that Libya has already investigated the deaths of all civilians during the fighting.

“I hope that the reason for raising this matter will not be to impede or prevent the international community from interfering in the situation of other states where their peoples are being massacred and killed at the hands of their rulers,” Keib said.

Libya said last month that it would donate $100 million in humanitarian aid to the Syrian opposition and allow them to open an office in Tripoli.

Libya was one of the first foreign states to recognize the Syrian National Council as the country’s legitimate authority in October - a gesture it said showed solidarity after Libya’s own struggle to oust Gaddafi and end 42 years of autocratic rule.

“The world should help the Syrian people because they have seen that things are moving forward in our case and before that in Egypt and before that in Tunisia,” Keib told the International Peace Institute earlier on Wednesday.

“They might find it needs to be treated differently (to Libya), but definitely the objective is to help the Syrian people gain their freedom,” he said.