The UN General Assembly on Wednesday condemned the Syrian government’s “escalation” of the country’s war and backed the role of the opposition coalition in transition talks.

But Russia, Syria’s key diplomatic ally, fiercely opposed the resolution, branding it a potential obstacle to peace negotiations expected to be held in Geneva next month.

And only 107 countries in the 193-member assembly backed the text, down from 133 when the last Syria vote was held in August.

The United States, Britain and France joined Arab countries in supporting the resolution which expressed “outrage at the rapidly increasing death toll,” now estimated at more than 80,000 by Syrian activists.

Russia, China, Syria, Iran and North Korea were among 12 countries to oppose the resolution. Fifty-nine countries, including Brazil, South Africa, India and Indonesia abstained.

The assembly “strongly condemns the continued escalation in the use by the Syrian authorities of heavy weapons”, including “ballistic missiles” against civilians, said the resolution, which was drawn up by Qatar and other Arab states.

On political efforts to end the war, the assembly demanded all sides work to “implement rapidly” a communique agreed by the major powers in Geneva in June last year laying out the steps toward a transitional government.

The resolution welcomed the opposition Syrian National Coalition “as effective representative interlocutors needed for a transition.” This phrase infuriated Russia which said it would encourage the opposition to step up “armed actions” against the Syrian government.

The Arab League has recognized the coalition as Syria’s legitimate government. There was no recognition in the UN text but Arab states are said to be planning moves to get the coalition into Syria’s UN seat later this year.

Russia and the United States agreed to press for a new international conference on the war which is expected to be held in Geneva next month. Russia’s UN ambassador Vitaly Churkin wrote to all 193 UN members ahead of the vote to slam the resolution as “one-sided and biased”.

Russia and China have vetoed three UN Security Council resolutions, proposed by western nations, aiming to step up pressure on President Bashar al-Assad over the conflict.

And Western nations strongly backed the new assembly resolution.

“The consequences of this crisis are growing more dire not only within Syria, but across the region,” said deputy US ambassador Rosemary DiCarlo, who added that backing the resolution was in line with efforts to set up a peace conference.

France’s UN ambassador Gerard Araud said the resolution would help the opposition to unite for any peace conference.

“This is a substantive draft that reflects the horrific situation on the ground and pushes for a political solution,” said Germany’s UN ambassador Peter Wittig.

Qatar’s UN ambassador Meshal Hamad Al-Thani called the resolution “fair and balanced” but the text was slammed by Syria’s UN ambassador Bashar Jaafari as an attempt “to escalate the crisis and fuel violence in Syria.”

The UN assembly passed a resolution condemning Syria in August last year with 133 countries in favour, 12 votes against and 31 abstentions.

Diplomats said the lower number voting in favor this time reflected the international divisions over Syria and doubts about how it can be ended.

The resolution called for “urgent” international financing to help countries struggling with more than 1.4 million Syrian refugees. Jordan in particular has said the refugees are now a threat to its stability.

AFP - 05/15/2013

18/11/12

Is it time to arm the Syrian opposition?

French President Francois Hollande (L) shakes hands with Syrian opposition chief Ahmed Moaz al-Khatib after a press conference following a meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris, on November 17, 2012. AFP PHOTO/KENZO TRIBOUILLARD

PARIS: France boosted its support for Syria’s new opposition coalition Saturday with a promise to let it appoint an envoy to Paris, but remained cautious about supplying weapons to rebels trying to oust President Bashar al-Assad.

11/13/12

France has become the first European nation to recognise Syria’s opposition coalition as the sole legitimate representative of the Syrian people.

The move was announced by President Francois Hollande at a televised news conference in Paris.

Syrian opposition groups struck a deal in the Qatari capital Doha on Sunday to form a broad coalition to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad.

It came after 20 months of an uprising against his rule.

“I announce today that France recognises the Syrian national coalition as the sole legitimate representative of the Syrian people and as future government of a democratic Syria, allowing it to bring an end to Bashar al-Assad’s regime,” Mr Hollande told reporters.

The National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces has been calling on European nations to recognise it as the country’s transitional government, enabling it to buy weapons to assist its attempts to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad.

Mr Hollande said France would look at the question of arming the coalition.

“On the question of weapons deliveries, France did not support it as long as it wasn’t clear where these weapons went,” he said.

“With the coalition, as soon as it is a legitimate government of Syria, this question will be looked at by France, but also by all countries that recognise this government.”

Nov 13/12

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius urged world powers on Tuesday to recognize the newly formed Syrian opposition bloc.

“Our hope is that the different countries recognize the Syrian national coalition as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people… France’s role is to make that hope possible,” Fabius told reporters in Cairo.

After four days of talks in the Qatari capital Doha, Syrian opposition groups agreed on Sunday to unite under the banner of the National Coalition, headed by moderate Muslim cleric Ahmed Moaz al-Khatib.

European Union foreign ministers meeting in Cairo welcomed the bloc and urged it to bring in more regime dissenters.

“The opposition has taken a huge step forward,” said Fabius, who met earlier with both Khatib and George Sabra, the head of the Syrian National Council, the powerful opposition group that finally agreed to join the wider, more representative bloc.

-AFP

27/10/12

Reports of renewed fighting unravels

temporary #Syrian truce

(CNN) — An early morning explosion rocked the flashpoint city of Deir Ezzor on Saturday in an attack that further eroded an already shaky temporary cease-fire called over the observance of a four-day Muslim holiday.

The Syrian government accused “terrorists” of detonating a car bomb outside a church, a claim that appeared to counter reports by opposition groups that a military police building was the target.

More violence flared in the Damascus suburb of Erbeen, where eight people were killed and several more wounded in a Syrian military airstrike, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a London-based activist group.

The latest unrest follows opposition claims of more than 100 people killed in bomb blasts and clashes just hours after the truce began on Friday, coinciding with the start of the Eid al-Adha holiday.

Both sides in the civil war accused the other of violating the conditions of the cease-fire, with the government saying its soldiers were responding to “terrorist attacks” — a term routinely used by President Bashar al-Assad to describe rebel assaults.

U.N.-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi negotiated the truce with the hope of stemming the killings that have gripped the country since March 2011 when protesters inspired by the success of popular revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia took to the streets to demand the ouster of al-Assad.

More than 32,000 people, according to the opposition, have been killed in the fighting that followed a brutal crackdown on demonstrators.

CNN could not confirm reports of casualties or violence as access to the country by international journalists has been severely restricted.

With the attack in Deir Ezzor, one of the centers of heavy fighting in recent months, hopes dimmed that the cease-fire would still take hold for the remainder of the religious holiday.

The government said the explosion damaged the facade of the church, according to the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency.

Syrian forces, meanwhile, fired a volley of mortar rounds at Sunni-dominated neighborhoods in what appeared to be a retaliation for the bombing, Hani al-Thafiri, an opposition activist working in the city, told CNN.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the car bomb.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights also reported the explosion, which it described as being near a restaurant, and subsequent clashes. The group said at least five civilians had been killed, while the opposition Local Coordination Committees of Syria said two civilians died.

Both groups reported clashes between Syrian forces and rebel fighters in parts of Idlib province, as well as rocket fire and heavy shelling by government forces. The LCC also reported mortar fire in the Aleppo, Damascus and Hama areas.

Across Syria on Saturday, the LCC claimed 12 people were killed. Among the dead were the casualties in Deir Ezzor as well as six others who were killed in clashes in the capital city of Damascus.

The civil war has been playing out largely along sectarian lines with predominantly Sunni rebels trying to unseat al-Assad and his Alawite minority.

Al-Assad is himself an Alawite, which has distant ties to the Shiite faith.

The sectarian split in fighting has also spilled over into a diplomatic divide, with al-Assad backed by Shiite-dominated Iran and the rebels receiving support from Sunni-led Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states.

World leaders have condemned the civil war and repeatedly called on al-Assad to step down.

Efforts by the U.N. Security Council to stop the violence have been at a standstill, with Russia and China refusing to go along with the United States, France and others’ call for intervention.

Russia, a Cold War ally of Syria, has said Syrians should decide the outcome of the uprising not the United Nations.

01/10/12

At U.N., #Syrian foreign minister

expected to defend government role

in civil war

(CNN) — Syria’s foreign minister is expected Monday to defend his country’s handling of the 18-month civil war before the U.N. General Assembly, just as newly released casualty figures put the conflict’s human toll at nearly 28,000.

At least 95 people were killed Monday, including 12 children, according to the opposition Local Coordination Committees of Syria.

The government, on state-run media, said its forces carried out operations against gatherings of “terrorists” in Aleppo and elsewhere, inflicting “heavy losses.” Seventeen citizens were “martyred in terrorists’ shelling” on a village in Homs Sunday, the government said.

Here is the latest in the Syrian uprising:

Syria to face a hostile audience at the United Nations

Foreign Minister Walid Moallem is scheduled to speak to the U.N. General Assembly just days after world leaders painted a grim picture of the conflict.

Syria has dominated much of the General Assembly discussion — on stage and on the sidelines — as world leaders struggle to find a way to resolve the war that has left the Security Council hopelessly deadlocked.

Moallem is heading up the Syrian delegation at the United Nations, where he has been meeting with foreign ministers to drum up support for President Bashar al-Assad’s government.

But Moallem’s anticipated defense of the conflict before the general assembly is unlikely to be well received.

“What has the international community done to stop this carnage?” Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said last week. “Literally nothing. We have yet to see a single effective action to save innocent lives.”

Germany also slammed the U.N. Security Council for failure to act, and the United States, Britain and France announced they are backing increased support of non-lethal aid to the Syrian opposition.

The Security Council has been paralyzed by a division over how to halt the killing in Syria. Russia and China have blocked resolutions calling for al-Assad to transfer power and step down, saying the issue should be settled by Syrians.

Iraq will conduct random searches of Iranian planes bound for Syria to check for arms shipments, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari said in an interview published Sunday in the al-Hayat newspaper.

Zebari said Iraq will not act as a passageway or a channel for arms to make their way into Syria. “We are not with the militarization of the conflict. We are against the arming the regime or the opposition,” he said.

The foreign minister told the newspaper that U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and others raised concerns about arms shipments. The United States believes Iran, one of al-Assad’s strongest supporters, is arming government forces.

Clinton has called on Syria’s neighbors to take steps to prevent Iran from using its land and airspace to deliver shipments to Syria.

Iraq faces a difficult task in enforcing the inspections, Zebari said.

“We explained to the U.S. side that Iraq’s air defense capabilities are limited, and we are in the stage of building our air force,” he said.

More: Syrian rebels claim knowledge of chemical weapons site

Iranian flights over Iraq to Syria began in March but were stopped shortly after at the request of Iraq, Zebari said. The flights resumed in July.

“They said these flights contain no weapons or hardware, and that they transport pilgrims, visitors and so on. But to verify their shipments, we will ask these planes to land,” Zebari said.

Last week, Baghdad rejected a request from North Korea to fly through its airspace to Syria because of a suspicion the flight was carrying arms.

Hama Massacre recalled as troops move into city

Syrian security forces are overseeing the systematic displacement of thousands and then demolishing their neighborhood in the western flashpoint city of Hama, residents told CNN.

As security forces surround the Mesha Alarbeen district in Hama and bulldozers tear down homes inside, the Hama Massacre is still fresh in the minds of many who live there.

Between 3,000 and 40,000 people were believed to have died when the military acting under orders from Hafez al-Assad — the father of the current Syrian president — brutally cracked down on a revolt in 1982. A1983 Amnesty International report put the toll on both sides between 10,000 and 25,000.

Hama is once again an epicenter of the anti-government movement that has roiled the country.

“So far they have razed 120 buildings,” Osamah, a Hama resident who visited the neighborhood on Sunday, told CNN.

The Syria toll, so far

The Syrian conflict broke out in March 2011 after unarmed protesters, inspired by the success of popular uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia, took to the streets demanding political reform.

The movement devolved into an armed conflict after a brutal crackdown by government forces.

Newly released casualty figures form the opposition Local Coordination Committees of Syria put the number of civilians and opposition fighters killed in the unrest at 27,954 people.

Of those casualties, the LCC claims more than 24,000 were civilians.

Thousands of Syrian troops also have been reportedly killed.

CNN is unable to independently confirm casualty reports as the Syrian government has severely limited the access of international journalists.

The new casualty figures revealed August was the deadliest month in the conflict, with 5,091 killed. In September, 4,071 people were killed, according to the LCC.

Background: The toll of Syria’s civil war — so far

The Syrian conflict broke out in March 2011 after unarmed protesters, inspired by the success of popular uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia, took to the streets demanding political reform.

The movement devolved into an armed conflict after a brutal and continuing crackdown by government forces.

Since the unrest began, more than 30,000 people have died, the opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

01/10/12

The Assad regime in Syria brought about Muammar

Gaddafi’s death by providing France with the key

intelligence which led to the operation that killed

him, sources in Libya have claimed.

A National Transitional Council (NTC) fighter holds a picture of the Libyan fallen leader Muammar Al Gaddafi

While it was not possible independently to verify his allegation, Nicolas Sarkozy, the former French president, played a leading role in both the Nato mission to bomb Libya and in bringing international pressure to bear on the Assad regime.

The claims by Mr El Obeidi, the former head of foreign intelligence for the movement that overthrew Gaddafi, followed comments by Mahmoud Jibril, who served as prime minister in the transitional government and now leads one of Libya’s largest political parties. He confirmed over the weekend that a foreign “agent” was involved in the operation that killed Gaddafi.

He did not identify his nationality. However the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera quoted Western diplomats in Tripoli as saying that if a foreign agent was involved “he was almost certainly French”.

The news of the Syria deal could potentially embarrass Nato, which initially claimed that it did “not target individuals”.

According to the alliance’s official version, an RAF reconnaissance plane spotted a large convoy of vehicles trying to flee Sirte on Oct 20th last year, two months after Gaddafi fled Tripoli.

Nato warplanes then bombed the convoy, apparently unaware of who was travelling in it, before militia fighters later found Gaddafi hiding in a drainpipe. He is believed to have been killed by his captors en route to the city of Misurata, west of Sirte.

But Mr El Obeidi said that France had essentially masterminded the operation by directing Libyan militiamen to an ambush spot where they could intercept Gaddafi’s convoy.

He also suggested that France had little interest in how Gaddafi was treated once captured, although the fighters were encouraged to try to take him alive.

“French intelligence played a direct tole in the death of Gaddafi, including his killing,” Mr El Obeidi said.

“They gave directions that he was to be apprehended, but they didn’t care if he was bloodied or beaten up as long as he was delivered alive.”

_{Bashar al-Assad, right, and his brother Maher}

According to Mr El Obeidi, French intelligence began to monitor Gaddafi’s Iridium satellite telephone and made a vital breakthrough when he rang a senior loyalist, Yusuf Shakir and Ahmed Jibril, a Palestinian militant leader, in Syria.

As a result, they were able to pinpoint his location and monitor his movements. Although Turkish and British military intelligence officers – including the SAS – who were in Sirte at the time were informed of the ambush plans in advance they played no role in what was “an exclusive French operation”, Mr El Obeidi said.

At the time of Gaddafi’s death, Mr El Obeidi had fallen out of favour with the most powerful faction in Libya’s transitional government because of his links with Gen Abdul Fatah Younes, a senior rebel commander killed by his own side in July last year.

Even so, he continued in his intelligence role in a semi-official but senior capacity.

Sources quoted by Corriere della Sera said one reason for the French lead in the operation was that then President Nicolas Sarkozy wanted Gaddafi dead after the Libyan leader openly threatened to reveal details of the large amounts of money he had donated to Sarkozy for his 2007 election campaign.

“Sarkozy had every reason to want to get rid of the colonel as quickly as possible,” Western diplomats said, according to the newspaper.

A spokesman at the French foreign ministry refused to confirm or deny the claims.

29/09/12

By Andrew Quinn and Amena Bakr

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The United States and France announced increased support for opponents of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Friday, but there was no sign that the direct military aid the rebels want to create safe havens for civilians is on the way.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told a meeting of foreign ministers in New York that the United States would provide an additional $45 million in non-lethal and humanitarian aid to the Syrian opposition.

Of this, $30 million would be for humanitarian assistance and $15 million for non-lethal help, such as radios and training. The new pledges pushed total U.S. humanitarian aid for Syria to more than $130 million, and non-lethal aid to opposition groups to almost $45 million.

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius told the same meeting of the so-called Friends of Syria - an informal group of countries supporting Assad’s ouster - that Paris was increasing its contacts with Syria’s armed rebels.

“The process is complex but the Syrian people have been waiting for 18 months for the opposition to succeed to move forward,” Fabius said. “It is within this perspective that France has increased its contacts with representatives of the armed opposition.”

British Foreign Secretary William Hague backed an increase in practical support to Syria’s political opposition, especially to those who needed to provide services in rebel areas.

The 18-month-old uprising against Assad has descended into a civil war. More than 30,000 people have been killed, according to opposition activists, and there are fears the conflict could destabilize the wider Middle East.

But despite Friday’s announcements, foreign assistance to the Syrian rebels has fallen well short of the foreign-protected safe havens the opposition wants and offers little hope of relief to the worsening plight of civilians.

France started channeling aid to rebel-held parts of Syria in August so that these safe havens could administer themselves and help stanch a flow of refugees trying to escape deadly air strikes by Assad’s forces.

However, credible protection for “liberated” areas would require no-fly zones patrolled by foreign aircraft and there appears little chance of this happening.

Such an intervention would require a mandate from the U.N. Security Council - something resolutely opposed by veto-wielding members Russia and China.

The council’s deadlock appears unbreakable at the moment, Western diplomats say.

The deadlock led frustrated Western powers, Turkey and Gulf Arab states to establish the informal Friends of Syria group, but Western powers have said they will not supply weapons to the lightly armed Syrian rebels, who have few answers to attacks by Assad’s combat planes and helicopter gunships.

CLINTON BLAMES IRAN

Clinton blamed Iran for propping up Assad, saying Tehran would do all it could to support him. “Let’s be very frank here - the regime’s most important lifeline is Iran,” she said.

“Last week a senior Iranian official publicly acknowledged that members of the Iranian (Islamic) Revolutionary Guard Corps are operating inside Syria,” Clinton said.

“There is no longer any doubt that Tehran will do whatever it takes to protect its proxy and crony in Damascus. Iran will do everything it can to evade international sanctions.”

She was referring to international steps to force Iran to abandon its nuclear program, which the West says is aimed at producing atomic bombs. Tehran says the program is for generating electricity and other non-military purposes.

The U.N. General Assembly’s annual gathering of world leaders this week saw sharp clashes between Iran and Israel.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu suggested that Israel might take military action to prevent Iran from reaching the point where it has enough enriched uranium for a bomb. On Friday, the United Nations urged all sides to tone down “shrill war talk.”

Arab League chief Nabil Elaraby told the Friends of Syria group, which was meeting on the sidelines of General Assembly, that the situation in Syria was becoming “more explosive.”

“We need to start a transitional period,” he said. “A transitional period means a change to another regime.”

The Friends of Syria includes the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey. Russia and China, which have vetoed three U.N. Security Council resolutions condemning Assad’s onslaught on the opposition, are not members.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, who attended the meeting, later told the U.N. General Assembly it was “the inability of the Security Council to act that still encourages the Syrian regime to kill ever more people.”

“The situation in Syria has evolved into a real threat to regional peace and security,” he said. “The Syrian regime deploys every instrument to turn the legitimate struggle of the Syrian people into a sectarian war, which will engulf the entire region into flames.”

Qatari Foreign Minister Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber al-Thani told reporters he was not satisfied with the international response on Syria.

“We have to send a military force to stop the bloodshed, this is request from Qatar’s emir,” he told reporters.

German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle called the blockage at the Security Council “unacceptable,” and added: “It is necessary to unite the opposition.”

Qatar said it would organize a meeting soon to try to unite all strands of the Syrian opposition in an effort to create a provisional government. Earlier this week, Qatar called for Arab nations to “interfere” in Syria.

Fabius said he wanted this government to be recognized by the Friends of Syria at its next meeting in Morocco.

Moroccan Foreign Minister Saad-Eddine Al-Othmani said the meeting would probably be held on November 1, but he did not expect it to reach a plan on how to proceed. (Additional reporting by John Irish; writing by Louis Charbonneau and David Brunnstrom; editing by Christopher Wilson and Mohammad Zargham)

28/09/12
By John Irish and Amena Bakr

(Reuters) - Western and Arab states demanding Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s exit are under pressure to produce a plan to make that happen, but their unwillingness to act outside a deadlocked U.N. Security Council leaves them looking fractured and powerless.

Foreign ministers and senior diplomats from the “Friends of Syria” - a group that includes the United States, France, Saudi Arabia and Turkey - are due to meet in New York on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly on Friday.

“I just expect ideas to be presented. There will be no concrete plans,” Arab League Secretary General Nabil El-Erabi told Reuters. “Governments are not ready to put plans into action and the Security Council is not agreeing on anything.”

The 18-month uprising against Assad’s rule has killed around 30,000 people, according to activists. The protests have further escalated into an armed insurgency fighting with sectarian overtones that could drag in regional powers.

The General Assembly this week highlighted the global stalemate, with most of the 193-states condemning events in Syria but showing no substance behind their rhetoric.

Russia, which has three times vetoed a Security Council resolution on Syria, stuck to its position: Assad’s departure should not be a precondition for a political transition and under no circumstances will it support a U.N. resolution that could lead to military intervention.

Painting a bleak picture of mediation efforts, U.N.-Arab League representative Lakhdar Brahimi told the Security Council that the situation in Syria is worsening and Assad’s government is clinging to the hope of returning to the past. Five weeks into the job, he admitted he had no plan but “a few ideas.”

Opponents of the Syrian president look less united in their approach. Qatar, one of Assad’s strongest critics, called for an alternative plan and once again urged Arab states to create a regional force to stop the bloodshed.

But Saudi Arabian and Egyptian diplomats, representing the two countries most likely to compose such a force, told Reuters Qatar’s plans are unrealistic.

Egypt, under new Islamist President Mohamed Mursi, tried to bring together Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Iran - Assad’s main ally in the region - for talks on finding a solution, but failed to get them around the table for the second time.

President Barack Obama, preoccupied with his re-election bid on November 6, barely mentioned Syria in his address to delegates. Former colonial power France urged the U.N. to protect areas “liberated” in Syria, but officials acknowledged behind the scenes the calls were essentially symbolic.

FAILED MEDIATION

Most nations, including Russia and China, agree on the principles of a previously proposed six-point peace plan and framework of an accord struck in Geneva between the permanent members of the Security Council.

Both those plans are stillborn unless an agreement with Russia can be struck on how to ensure they are implemented.

“Unfortunately, all these mediations have failed,” Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu told Reuters. “We all support Lakhdar Brahimi, but we have learned that there must be a stronger mandate given to the special representative.”

He said the Friends of Syria was created to defend the rights of the Syrian people and not to undermine the United Nations. The group now seems as hamstrung as the Security Council.

Western and Arab diplomats describe Friday’s meeting as an opportunity to “exchange ideas.” The session will assess efforts to create an all-inclusive transitional government and increase humanitarian and non-lethal aid to the opposition.

France and Turkey have also called for no-fly zones patrolled by foreign aircraft to protect rebel-held areas. With the United States lukewarm, the proposal remains just an idea.

“We have obviously never at any point taken anything off the table,” a U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said ahead of Friday’s meeting. “We believe that there is still room for a negotiated transition that leads to an interim government and ultimately to a new Syria. This is not about drawing red lines.”

‘LEGITIMATE CHANNELS’

One senior Gulf Arab diplomat echoed the U.S. position, warning against any direct military intervention. He said Arab states see the United States as key to breaking the deadlock.

“Going through legitimate channels to resolve the issue is the best path to take; any action taken by individual countries will only lead to more violence,” he said.

“The U.S. is the only country that could force Russia to change its position,” the diplomat said, adding that he sees no real move on the crisis until after the U.S. election.‬‪

With the main political opposition bodies fragmented, the Friends of Syria’s main push could centre on developing contacts with the Free Syrian Army (FSA), particularly as its fighters oust Assad’s forces from significant portions of the country.

Western European powers have ruled out supplying weapons to lightly armed Syrian rebels, but France is increasing its links with insurgents. “The more the opposition advances the easier it will become,” the Arab League’s El-Arabi said.

Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar have been overseeing cross-border movements from a secret liaison centre in Turkey. Turkey denies any direct involvement in sending arms across the frontier. U.N. diplomats say Saudi Arabia and Qatar have transferred weapons to rebels.

“The Friends of Syria can’t do much,” said a Paris-based Arab diplomat. “It’s sit, wait and hope the rebels gain ground.”

(Additional reporting by Andrew Quinn; Editing by Will Dunham)

26/09/12

This file picture shows Syrian Ambassador to Lebanon Ali Abdel-Karim Ali in Masnaa. (AP Photo/Samer Husseini)

09/25/12

This photo by the Syrian official news agency SANA shows Syrian firefighters extinguishing a fire in a damaged school after a bomb attack in Damascus. (AP Photo/SANA)

16/09/12

On August 26, after hundreds of Syrians were found dead in Daraya, a town outside Damascus, Alia Mansour, a member of the Syrian National Council’s General Secretariat, announced that she was going on a hunger strike to protest the world’s silence over the massacres in her home country. Only a few days later, other activists from around the world joined Mansour. Today, as she ends her hunger strike, 53 other activists continue the protest. NOW Lebanon speaks to Mansour about her initiative and to fellow hunger striker Lina Tibi about their mission.    

“It was dawn and everyone was asleep,” said Mansour. “I was receiving the news, and the number of those found dead in Daraya was increasing dramatically; it was first 250, then it increased to 300, then later 44o… Now it is somewhere over 1,200, 700 of which are documented by name.  The fact that we Syrians have become just numbers was ripping me apart. I then announced that I was going on a hunger strike,” she told NOW.

When Mansour first decided to strike, she contacted other members of the SNC to propose they join her as opposed to only writing a statement of condemnation over the Daraya massacre. “I wanted it to be an outcry,” she said. “An outcry from the council to the Syrian people to say ‘We’re with you,’ and to the international community to say, ‘Enough with the silence.’”

Although there was no official position from the SNC in support of Mansour’s move, four other SNC members joined her hours later and issued their own statement calling upon activists from all around the world to join them.

“Our colleague Firas Kassas in Germany announced he was on hunger strike and was able to demonstrate for 10 days in front of the German Foreign Affairs Ministry. We wanted to organize something of the sort here in Lebanon, but we were not able to due to the security situation,” said Mansour.

The next day activists from nearby countries joined the strike. Today over 53 people from Lebanon, France, Jordan and Egypt—both Syrians and not—have joined the campaign. Although they differ on the specifics of their demands, all agree on denouncing the massacres in Syria and the paralysis of the international community. The SNC members and some other activists went further and stressed the need for direct intervention and for imposing a no-fly zone and humanitarian corridors.

A group of six women in Egypt organized a sit-in in Cairo in front of the Arab League headquarters near Tahrir Square. Syrian writer and poet Lina Tibi took up the hunger strike on September 4 and has been demonstrating in front of the league for nine days now. In a letter submitted to the new UN peace envoy for Syria, Lakhdar Brahimi, Tibi stressed on the situation of women and children in Syria and called for direct intervention for their protection.

“We also stressed in our letter the need for Egyptian authorities to stop ships from passing through the Suez to Syria, because we believe that these ships are coming from Iran and China and contain weapons that are used against our own people.”

The women’s group in Egypt received a large amount of attention from the Egyptian media, MPs, intellectuals and activists.

But the wider hunger striking campaign received little media attention overall because the increasing number of massacres and war crimes has left little space for any news of activism, Mansour said. “We in the council hope that the hunger strike campaign will have an impact. However, we are giving the internal situation more priority to support the people inside,” she said.

“We are receiving letters from people inside Syria in appreciation of our support. We are also receiving letters from abroad stating that although not much can be done in terms of influencing the international community’s decisions, much is being done to influence civil society organizations abroad to spread the word of the massacres taking place so that NGOs will support us.”

Soon after the strike began, the coordination committee within the SNC issued a statement requesting the SNC members to end their strike. According to Mansour, the committee was afraid that members would retreat from their daily duties on the council.

“I received calls from other members asking that I end my strike… but I decided to continue working as I was fasting.  I have been carrying out my relief work and flying in out of the country as my strike continues. But it was a colleague comment that urged the need to end my strike. He told me I was no longer efficient.”

While Mansour ended her strike after almost three weeks of only subsisting on yogurt and water and occasionally a glass of juice, the women in Egypt stressed that they will not break their fast until they achieve their demands.

“It’s suicidal, I know, but we believe that our people inside Syria are on hunger strike by force, and so we will only end our strike when the Syrian people end theirs.”

“We will persist with our strike and we have called upon the world to support the women and children of Syria on September 22 with us for a day of hunger striking.”

13/09/12

A clear majority of Turks are against a military intervention to put a halt to the violence in Syria, according to a recent poll by the German Marshall Fund.

Some 57 percent of Turkish respondents in the Transatlantic Trends survey categorically rejected a Turkish invasion after being asked: “Recently, there has been discussion of the desirability of intervening in Syria, where the government has been using military force to suppress an opposition movement which is fighting the Syrian government. In this situation, what do you think [Turkey] should do?”

The number of respondents opposed to a Turkish intervention would jump to 63 percent if Russia and China used their position as permanent members of the U.N. Security Council to veto an intervention.

At the same time, 32 percent of Turks said the country should intervene.

The findings mirrored numbers elsewhere in the world, where 55 percent of U.S. respondents opposed an intervention, as did 59 of their EU counterparts.

The poll also revealed that Turks concerned about Iran’s potential acquisition of nuclear weapons outnumber those without such worries for the first time.

The survey, which has been conducted for the last 11 years, included Russia for the first time this year. While Americans, Europeans and Turks give broad approval to the responsibility to protect civilians from violence, a concept that came to dominate the international agenda with the wars in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo and, most recently, in Libya, they differed on how fulfilling such a responsibility should be approached.

Russia (at 40 percent), as well as Turkey and Poland (at 42 percent each), exhibited the lowest amount of support for the principle of the responsibility to protect civilians from violence. The EU average was 67 percent, with Sweden (81 percent) and France (76 percent) recording the highest rates of agreement.

Only 35 percent of the Turks agreed that war was sometimes necessary to obtain justice, one percentage point above the European average. In contrast, the rate was 74 percent in the United States.

After Russia, Turkish respondents were the most dismissive of the notion that intervening in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya was the correct course of action, exhibiting rates of just 23 percent on Iraq, 19 percent on Afghanistan and 20 percent on Libya. In the EU, the average was 38 percent for Iraq, 42 percent for Afghanistan and 48 percent for Libya.

While majorities in the polled countries favored a withdrawal of international forces from Afghanistan, Turkey differed from the others, with 37 percent saying the forces should be kept at their current level – putting it second in the category behind Sweden at 45 percent.

Only 22 percent of Turks favored a complete withdrawal from Afghanistan, making it the lowest in Europe, 53 percent of whose respondents favor a total pullout.

In all, most respondents are pessimistic about the prospects of stability in Afghanistan, as 70 percent of EU citizens and 56 percent of Americans expressed worries on the matter. The level of pessimism about Iraq’s future was 64 percent in the EU and 50 percent in the U.S., while 46 percent in the EU and 40 percent in the U.S. said they doubted Egypt would have a stable future.

Turks worried about Iranian nuclear weapons

The number of Turks expressing concern about Iran’s acquisition of nuclear weapon visibly rose this year, to 48 percent, from 38 percent in 2011 and 40 percent in 2010.

The number who said they were not concerned was 41 percent this year, while it was 51 percent in 2011 and 48 percent in 2010.

Turkey, the U.S., European countries and Russia differed on what to do about Iran’s nuclear program. Only 4 percent of Turks – the lowest of those polled – supported a military strike, but support for an attack was also low elsewhere, at 5 percent in Russia, 7 percent in Europe and 18 percent in the U.S.

Some 27 percent of Turkish respondents said it was acceptable for the Islamic republic to acquire atomic weapons – the highest number among those polled. The same rate was 13 percent in Russia, 8 percent in the U.S. and 6 percent in the EU.

As a means to persuading Tehran to drop its alleged drive for atomic weapons, 34 percent of EU respondents supported offering economic incentives, versus 20 percent in the U.S. and 12 percent in Turkey. Only 16 percent of Turkish respondents agreed with the notion of imposing economic sanctions on Tehran, in comparison to 32 percent in the U.S. and 28 percent in the EU.

Turks and Americans were also diametrically opposed on a potential Israeli strike against Iran, with 72 percent of Turks opposing the move versus 16 percent in favor. In contrast, 62 percent of Americans would back a raid by Tel Aviv versus 31 percent who would disapprove of such action.

10/10/12

Defector believes opposition can topple Assad forces with enough firepower

A soldier with the rebel Free Syrian Army is shown patrolling the streets of Aleppo in Syria on Monday. Manaf Tlass, the country’s most prominent defector to have joined the opposition, says the rebels need more weapons but can likely topple the regime of president Bashar al-Assad without foreign intervention. (Manu Brabo/Associated Press)

Syria’s most prominent defector said in an interview that aired Monday that he opposes any foreign military intervention in the country’s civil war and that he is confident the opposition can topple President Bashar al-Assad’s regime.

But Manaf Tlass, a Syrian general who was the first member of Assad’s inner circle to join the opposition, said the rebels need weapons

“The Syrian people must not be robbed of their victory, they must be given support, aid, arms,” Tlass said in a recorded interview that aired Monday on French television station BFM.

He called on outside powers to give the opposition “all the aid and support” needed to topple Assad.

Foreign military intervention, however, “could not provide a solution” to the conflict, he said. The uprising against Assad’s regime began in March 2011 with mostly peaceful protests against the family dynasty that has ruled Syria for four decades. But the battle has transformed into a civil war, and activists estimate that at least 23,000 people have been killed.

Tlass’ defection in July was hailed as a resounding triumph by many Syrian opposition activists. But many in the opposition are deeply suspicious of Tlass, saying he is just trying to vault to power. In the weeks after he abandoned the regime, Tlass began touring regional powers to garner support for the uprising.

Syrian Brig.-Gen. Manaf Tlass, who defected from the country, told a French radio station Monday his role in resolving the civil war is to ‘unify’ the Syrian opposition. However, those suspicious of his motives believe he’s after a power grab. (Burhan Ozbilici/Associated Press)

‘Bring together my people’

“My role is to unify, bring together my people, that is my role,” he said in Monday’s interview.

Tlass, who is in his 40s, is the son of former defence minister Mustafa Tlass, who was the most trusted lieutenant of the late Hafez Assad, the president’s father and predecessor.

Although the Assad regime has been hit by a string of defections, the inner circle has remained remarkably ironclad over the course of the conflict. Still, the government has not been able to crush the rebellion, leading to a murderous grind.

The new UN-Arab League envoy to the country, meanwhile, said the Syrian people are desperate for peace and stability.

Lakhdar Brahimi said he will travel to Syria this week to meet with regime officials as well as civic groups in a new bid to broker a diplomatic solution to the conflict.

“I answer to no one except the Syrian people,” Brahimi told reporters in Cairo, where he was meeting with Arab League officials and Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi. “Syrians aspire to peace, stability and to realizing their goals of freedom and political progress.”

Brahimi replaced former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who stepped down in August in frustration after his six-point peace plan that included a cease-fire collapsed.

Aleppo a main battleground

The fight for Aleppo, a city of three million that was once a bastion of support for Assad, has emerged as one of the main battlegrounds of the civil war. Its fall would give the opposition a major strategic victory with a stronghold in the north near the Turkish border. A rebel defeat, at the very least, would buy Assad more time.

Syria’s state run news agency, SANA, said Monday the death toll from a car bomb in the city the night before had risen to 30 civilians — including women and children — with 64 people wounded.

The blast happened near two hospitals. According to Aleppo-based activist Mohammed al-Hassan, one of the hospitals, Al-Hayat, was turned into a site for the treatment of government troops shortly after the fighting in Aleppo began in July.

SANA also reported that the blast was caused by a small truck rigged with more than 1,000 kilograms of explosives, which left a crater six metres deep.

SANA blamed terrorists, the term the regime uses for rebels, for the attack. But there was no immediate claim of responsibility from the rebels or any other group.

Some opposition activists disputed the SANA claim that the dead were all civilians. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, citing hospital sources that it did not name, said members of the military were among the dead.

It was impossible to confirm the claims. Syria heavily restricts media access to the country, making official media and activist reports crucial sources of information.