Lakhdar Brahimi has served as a UN special envoy in Iraq after the US invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein [Reuters]

10/08/2012

Diplomats have said  Lakhdar Brahimi, a former Algerian foreign affairs minister, is a strong candidate to replace Kofi Annan as the United Nations’ peace envoy to Syria.

Brahimi’s possible appointment could be announced as early as next week, but the diplomats, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said late on Thursday that there could be last-minute changes if a key government has concerns about the choice.

The former Algerian foreign affairs minister has a long history as a diplomatic troubleshooter, and will if appointed face tough challenges in Syria, where President Bashar al-Assad is using his security forces to try to crush a 17-month-old uprising.

Brahimi, 78, has served as a UN special envoy in a series of challenging circumstances, including in Iraq after the US invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein, and in Afghanistan both before and after the end of Taliban rule. He was posted in South Africa as it emerged from the apartheid era.

Syria, however, may present an unusually vexing assignment, in part because international action to try to end the violence has been stymied by the disagreements between the five veto-holding permanent members of the UN Security Council.

While the security council united in April to approve the deployment of 300 monitors to Syria to observe a failed ceasefire as part of Annan’s peace plan, Russia and China vetoed three other resolutions that criticized Syria and threatened sanctions against Damascus.

‘Finger-pointing’ 

Annan, a former UN secretary-general and Nobel Peace Prize laureate, said last week he would step down as the special envoy because he was unable to do his job with the UN Security Council hopelessly deadlocked over Syria.

In announcing his resignation, Annan explicitly blamed “finger-pointing and name-calling” at the Security Council for his decision to quit, but suggested his successor may have better luck.

In accepting Annan’s resignation, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon thanked him for having taken on “this most difficult and potentially thankless of assignments”.

A spokesman for Ban, who is expected to formally name Annan’s successor, was not immediately available for comment.

30/07/2012

Since the start of the conflict in Syria, Russia and China have each opposed three UN veto attempts to increase pressure on Damascus. One of our Observers in China, writing anonymously, deciphers his government’s policies and the Chinese media’s portrayal of the issue. 

“China finds a way to oppose anything related to human rights and supported by the West”

It is of course no surprise that China opposes the attempted UN veto against Syria. The Chinese government had already opposed the sanctions against North Korea [editor’s note: China, an ally of North Korea, had long supported dialogue with North Korea. Nonetheless, in April 2012, China voted for a series of sanctions against the North Korean nuclear programme], had opposed sanctions against Iran, and had abstained from voting on the UN resolution on an intervention in Libya.

 

Chinese authorities justify their decision against the veto by invoking the principle of non-interference in the domestic affairs of other states, but this is just an excuse. The Chinese position is always to support totalitarian regimes. I see the Chinese government as being an accomplice to the repression inflicted by the Syrian regime on its own people. Dictatorships have an unspoken agreement, part of which is to unite against the international community and to not meddle in the domestic affairs of other dictatorships. In a sense, the Chinese government espouses the philosophy that the “enemies of my enemies are my friends.” As a result, China finds a way to oppose anything related to human rights and supported by the West.

 

 

 

 

A headline on the front page of the Global Times: “The West seeks an excuse to launch a unilateral military campaign. American special forces are getting ready. The West is keeping an eye on Syria’s chemical weapons.”

 

 

The Global Times, which is the international version of the People’s Daily, the Communist party’s newspaper, has a very clear opinion on the Syria question. For instance, an editorial published on July 21 was titled “No one must applaud the western contortionists.” In other words: the West is tricking the Syrians by selling them its own ideals, but only to better impose itself on their country. The following is an excerpt from the article: “The Western powers are taking advantage of the fact that public opinion is on their side to speak ill of China and Russia. (…) In their cushy, modern offices, these western leaders relentlessly invoke the values of morality and liberty, but it is the poor Syrians who must fight the battle to realise these ideals. (…) Yet, after the change in the Syrian constitution [Editor’s note: February’s constitutional reform allowed political pluralism], it has become possible for Syria to undergo a peaceful democratic transition. However, the West prefers to push Syria to take a shortcut — one that will prove to be bloody and violent.”

 

The headline of another article from the Global Times recently read: “China must not be tricked by the West on Syria.” The article explains that the “source of China’s power is its people’s solidarity. With this immense power, each foreign policy supported by China will be very difficult to counteract. And all the world’s powers must fear us. (…) The West believes that the universal values it peddles have penetrated Chinese society and that they must influence China’s diplomatic positions. But this is wrong: the Chinese cannot be tricked so easily, and they resent the West’s too-frequent military interventions.”

 

In contrast, one can find blog posts that oppose the veto, like the following excerpt from Yan Changhai [Editor’s note: a Chinese author based in Shenzhen]: “All dictators use violence to oppress their people. Thus, I consider popular armed revolt to be self-defence. The fight for liberty and dignity is a just one. (…) The viewpoint of these authoritarian regimes has not really changed since the intervention in Libya last year. The economy is not, here, the crucial element [for the Chinese government]. The most important issue is that the Damascus regime not be overthrown, so that democratic elections cannot be organised, as occurred in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya. It’s still the same old fear that the Arab Spring will spill over into other authoritarian regimes, where people might in turn ask to elect their own leaders. Gaddafi’s regime fell - and he was executed - despite support from authoritarian governments; so, the Chinese government might support Assad this time around, but the changes in Syria are inevitable.”

26/07/2012

It has become clear to many officials in Moscow that the Assad regime cannot restore the pre-rebellion status quo in Syria, forcing them to consider backing away from a longtime client.

The phone line from Moscow to Syria is shaky, giving off static and a faint echo, and it does not help that Russian official Andrei Klimov sounds exhausted. He is cagey about his exact location in Syria, saying only that he is “a few kilometers away from the action.” That could mean any of a number of towns and cities where armed revolutionaries have been fighting the forces of President Bashar Assad for almost a year and a half. In that time, thousands of Syrian civilians have been killed, and dozens of Russian diplomats, officials and military strategists have been flying in and out of Damascus on various pretexts — as election observers, as peace-brokers or morale-boosters for the regime. Some Russians even ostensibly enter Syria as holiday makers. “Let’s just say I’m here for myself, in a personal capacity” says Klimov, who is the vice chairman of the foreign affairs committee in Russia’s parliament. Perhaps, but the purpose of his trip this week was also to figure out the regime’s options in the conflict, and Russia’s. “There don’t seem to be any good ones,” Klimov says.

Any hopes that Assad’s forces could bludgeon the rebellion into submission have started to look delusional. Even Russia, one of Assad’s oldest and most stubborn allies, is becoming resigned to his downfall. “I don’t think anyone in the world, including Assad himself, seriously believes that he will be able to control the country for years to come,” says Klimov. “In my view, the ideal situation is if Assad gives control over to someone else, who can maintain the secular nature of the regime and make sure Syria will not become a troublemaker in the region.”

(PHOTOS: The Syrian Arms Race: Photographs by Yuri Kozyrev)

If the Kremlin agrees with this assessment, it has not yet made public that conclusion. President Vladimir Putin has stuck consistently to the view that both sides of the conflict need to negotiate a resolution on their own, and he even suggested on July 23 that forcing Assad to step down would only make matters worse. “The opposition and the current leadership could simply switch sides, with one taking control and the other becoming the opposition, and the civil war will continue for nobody knows how long,” he told a joint press conference with Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti.

But a little further down the diplomatic hierarchy, the last few months have brought a significant change in tone. Just take Vitaly Churkin, Russian ambassador to the U.N., who in February had mounted a rousing defense of Russia’s refusal to turn its back on the Syrian government. “If you are our ally, we are not going to turn around overnight and say, ‘Well, you know, we’ve had good relations with you over the years, but now, thanks, no thanks, deal with your problems, we are not going to do anything about it,’” Churkin had told U.S. talk show host Charlie Rose. That was a veiled rebuke of Washington’s refusal to prop up its longstanding ally, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, during the revolution that overthrew him last year. “It’s not our style,” Churkin said at the time. But on Tuesday, July 24, he spoke to Charlie Rose again, and the host pressed him on whether the Russian-Syrian “friendship” had changed in the last six months. This time, Churkin gave a deep sigh before answering. Assad “is not our nephew, you know,” he said. “He’s not related to us, and we’re not attached to his regime in any particular way.”

Like a delinquent younger brother, Syria has nonetheless been causing Russia a great deal of embarrassment. Rarely can a senior Russian official make a public appearances these days, especially in the West, without being grilled on the massacre of civilians in Syria, on Russian arms sales to Assad, or on Russia’s repeated veto of U.N. sanctions against the regime. During a brief press conference on Monday, two of the four questions for Putin were about Syria, and he was visibly annoyed at having to repeat himself, giving his answers in a blunt staccato. On Tuesday, Moscow again had to distance itself from Syrian blunders, after Syria’s foreign ministry spokesman suggested the regime might use chemical weapons, prohibited under international humanitarian law, if it faced attack from abroad. On its website, the Russian Foreign Ministry then gave Damascus a curt reminder to “unwaveringly uphold its international obligations.”

(MORE: After Assad: What’s Next for the Future of Syria?)

Some Russian military officials have also been annoyed by what they see as Assad’s indecisiveness in fighting the rebels. Konstantin Sivkov, a military hawk who served as a strategist for the Russian General Staff between 1995 and 2007, visited Syria in May, ostensibly to monitor the parliamentary elections but mostly to meet with officials. Sivkov was surprised, he says, with how “gentle” Assad has been in crushing the revolution. “Believe me, some of our guys have told Bashar to adopt much harsher methods, carpet bombing, total destruction,” Sivkov told TIME after returning to Moscow. “If that approach was chosen in Syria, there would be no rebels left after one week, and everyone would be happy.”

Instead, Moscow has been put in the awkward position of having to invite the rebels over for talks, which gave perhaps the clearest signal that Russia is looking beyond Assad’s rule. On June 11, a delegation from the Syrian National Council had an audience with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who tried to convince them to negotiate with Assad. But the SNC delegates also felt as if the Russians were sizing them up. “They are looking for partners in the opposition,” Bassma Kodmani, the SNC’s foreign affairs officer told TIME afterward. One of the senior Russian diplomats even tried to express some sympathy with the rebel cause, says Monzer Makhous, an SNC member who took part in the talks. “During one of the breaks, he leaned over to me and said, ‘We know Assad is like Stalin, we know,’” Makhous recalls. To him that only meant one thing: “Some of them are ready, even eager, to abandon him.”

(VIDEO: A Syrian Soldier Claims to Have Witnessed Atrocities)

At the very least, Russia is tired of being looked upon as Assad’s protector. When rumors emerged in the Western press last week that Assad and his family might flee to Moscow, the Russian reaction was furious. “That is not on the table,” U.N. ambassador Churkin fumed on Wednesday during the interview with Rose. Russia has in the past given asylum to the families of embattled despots such as former Serbia president Slobodan Milosevic or former Kyrgyz strongman Askar Akaev, but the Assads are clearly too toxic to receive any such invitations.

Asked whether Russia might take him in, Klimov, the parliamentarian, finally raises his voice over the telephone line from Syria. “Why not Australia,” he demands. “Why don’t they give their fair contribution to the cause of international peace?” Russia has enough image problems as it is, Klimov says, and granting asylum to Assad’s family now “would be piled on top of Russia’s list of supposed sins.” On top of that, anyone that succeeds Assad “will despise Russia 100 times more if we give [him] safe haven,” adds Klimov.

So, much like the rest of the world, Russia is left to hope against hope that Assad will simply agree to step down. That does not mean, however, that Russia will join the rest of the world in pressuring to do so. The only one who can make such a drastic shift in Russian policy is Putin, and he has not caught the changing winds climbing up through his hierarchy. Last week, Russia and China used their veto power in the U.N. Security Council to block sanctions against Assad for the third time. This brought down another wave of condemnation from the West, but Putin did not give an inch in his rhetoric. “At home, this stand-off with the West is great for his image,” says Nikolay Zlobin, head of the Russia and Eurasia Project at the World Security Institute in Washington. Putin’s core electorate still reveres him as a one-man counterweight to the arrogance of the U.S., Zlobin says, and Putin is prepared to suffer a lot more isolation to maintain that image at home. But putting aside domestic Russian politics, “the hope is that some power vacuum will emerge [in Syria] into which Russia might squeeze,” says Zlobin. “So far, that strategy hasn’t worked out so well.” Not for Russia, and certainly not for Syria.

BEIJING (AFP) - UN chief Ban Ki-moon held talks Wednesday with Chinese President Hu Jintao as he seeks to press Beijing to back tougher action to stop violence in Syria hours ahead of a key Security Council vote.

Ban has already urged China to use its influence to back a peace plan by UN-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan, who is calling on the Security Council to order “consequences” for any failure to carry out his six-point plan.

But it will be a difficult task for the UN secretary general to persuade Beijing to back a Western resolution renewing the UN mission in the country that calls for sanctions if the regime does not pull back heavy weapons.

China, one of five veto-wielding members of the Security Council, has twice joined with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s main ally Russia in blocking resolutions critical of Damascus and has repeatedly warned against outside intervention in Syria.

“The life of Syria’s current political leadership can only be determined by the Syrian people,” said the People’s Daily, mouthpiece of the Communist Party, in an editorial on Tuesday.

“This is an internal matter and the international community should respect that.”

Russia has branded as “blackmail” the bid to link renewal of the UN mission to the threat of sanctions, and has pledged to veto the resolution calling for sanctions.

It proposed a new draft on Tuesday which was rejected by Britain, France, the United States, Germany and Portugal, diplomats said. The Russian draft would renew the mission for three months, but would not back it up with international action.

“Barring a last minute surprise, we should now go for a vote on Wednesday and we expect a veto by Russia and China,” said the UN envoy of a Western nation.

The current 90-day UN mission in Syria ends on Friday and if no resolution is passed by then, it would have to shut down this weekend, according to diplomats.

Following talks with Hu, Ban will also meet Vice President Xi Jinping — set to become China’s president next year — as well as top foreign policy advisor Dai Bingguo and Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi, diplomats said.

Ban, who is officially in Beijing for a China-Africa summit, has said that international inaction on Syria would be giving “a licence for further massacres”.

In Syria on Tuesday, troops blasted Damascus neighbourhoods with helicopter gunships and tank fire, witnesses said, after rebels announced an escalation of their battle for control of the capital.

Fighting between Assad’s forces and rebels of the Free Syrian Army has raged in Damascus since Sunday, with some activists saying it marked a “turning point” in the 16-month revolt against the regime.

Annan and Ban have both called for the Security Council to impose “consequences” if Assad and the Syrian opposition fail to carry out Annan’s peace plan.

Russia insists that diplomatic pressure is enough. According to diplomats, President Vladimir Putin spoke with China’s Hu at the weekend and the two agreed to oppose sanctions.

It’s not often that an international conference produces a pleasant surprise. But the 103 nations that attended a conference of Friends of the Syrian People in Paris yesterday did so.

The difference started with French President Francois Hollande’s inaugural address — where he described the crisis in Syria as “a threat to international security and peace.”

In diplomatic parlance, that’s a coded demand for the issue to be considered under Chapter 7 of the UN Charter — which allows for military intervention.

Hollande, in short, means to stop the Friends of the Syrian People from continuing to dance around the issue, as they did at previous gatherings in Tunis and Istanbul.

Hollande: French prez hints at military intervention.

To be sure, that doesn’t mean that the nations represented in Paris are ready to act in Syria as many did in Libya. But the acknowledgment of military intervention as an option is in itself important.

The conference also ended ambiguity over the role that the despot Bashar al-Assad might take in any transition to a new Syrian regime.

Former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan’s “road map” would give Assad a veto on who is included in a transition government. But the Paris conference showed a growing consensus that Assad must be scripted out of any negotiated settlement. Even if he’s to be temporarily replaced by one of his deputies, Assad would have to step aside before a deal is sealed.

Russia and China, two of Assad’s last remaining supporters, declined their invitations to Paris. The third, Iran, wasn’t even invited. All three appear to be having doubts about the wisdom of supporting an unpopular leader who may also be doomed.

Russian and Chinese spokesmen now claim that neither Moscow nor Beijing is “committed to Assad as such.” As for Tehran, the mullahs seem to be preparing to ditch Assad before they host a summit of the nonaligned nations this fall.

Many nonaligned leaders, including new Egyptian President Muhammad Mursi, have indicated they’ll boycott the summit if Iran doesn’t alter its pro-Assad stance. If Tehran continues to back Assad, it could end up with high-level representation from only two Arab states, Sudan and Lebanon, at its summit.

Russia now seems a classic opportunist; it’s looking for ways to prevent the United States and its allies from scoring a point by helping remove Assad from power. But Moscow also knows that courting Assad risks antagonizing a majority of the 22 Arab states.

So the Kremlin is desperately looking for a way to portray itself on the side of change in Syria without actually producing the kind of change that Western powers wish for.

Much work remains. But don’t be surprised if Russia takes the lead in selling the idea of a “dignified departure” to Assad. In Yemen, a similar deal was sold to President Ali Abdullah Salih by his principal protector, Saudi Arabia.

What is needed urgently is an end to the bloodshed. And that can’t be achieved while Assad has a central role.

Meanwhile, the first high-level defection from Assad’s inner circle has increased the possibility of “change within the regime.” Brig.-Gen. Manaf Tlas, 43, is a former commander in the Presidential Guard and one of Assad’s closest personal friends. His father, Gen. Mustafa Tlas, was a founder of the Ba’athist regime and served as chief of staff and then defense minister for more than two decades under Bashar’s father, Hafiz al-Assad.

The younger Tlas flew to Paris yesterday; he claims he decided to break with the regime after Assad’s younger brother, Maher, also a brigadier-general, ordered a massacre in the central Syrian town of Rastan — the seat of the Tlas, a leading Sunni clan.

Tlas’ defection ends the myth of solidarity among the despot’s “inner circle. In Damascus, people are already wondering who will be next.

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/fresh_hope_for_an_end_to_syria_pain_Gv8bnk4d1UVOtllCZytnlO#ixzz1ztzlBQln

by Ghassan Karam

Dictatorship is illegitimate by definition since it represents taking power by force and it maintains it through oppression, fear and brutality. That is one reason that most dictatorships, Arab ones in particular have felt the need to pretend that they are legitimate by setting up sham elections. As if anyone really believed that 99.9% support abuse and cruelty.

The Arab Spring has not given the Arab world a single dynamic democracy yet but it has given voice to the Arab masses who have decided to stand up and demand their right to be heard. Governance in the Arab world will never be the same again. Finally a movement has been born to tell dictators that the long journey to democracy and personal freedom, the journey to human dignity will not be stopped.

Bashar Assad of Syria exemplifies the tyranny of Arab dictatorships. His father rose to power through a coup and ruled the country under emergency law for 30 years. When Hafez Assad died his son Bashar, an ophthalmologist, inherited a country and continued the exploitation and the one man rule of governance.

Many Syrians were encouraged by the relative success of the Arab masses in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen and so initiated small roving peaceful demonstrations. Dictators do not seek the approval of those that they govern; instead they maintain control by the use of brutal secret service supporters/gangs that inflict random violence. The response of the Bashar Assad regime was initially subdued because he had feared that a sharp escalation would bring about a response from the world community similar to that in Libya.  As time passed the Syrian forces became more forceful but stopped shy of leveling civilian quarters in major cities with tanks and artillery. The West had warned that such attacks will not be tolerated but will be met with a stern response.

This is when Russia decided to step in and protect its only client in the Arab world. Russia sent armaments and assured the Syrian regime that Russia and China will veto any attempt by the Security Council to pass any measures similar to what had happened in Libya. The regime then tested the will of the international community by waging a strong military attack on a neighbourhood in Hama. No meaningful Western response was forthcoming.  Russia and China delivered on their promise to keep the UN Security Council in check. This emboldened the Syrian regime to try its strong military tactics again in Homs.  Again the West failed to act. Since then the Syrian government, shielded by Russia and China and helped by Iran has been acting with impunity.

One Arab League initiative, which was passed through the UN Security Council, appointed Kofi Annan to find a peaceful solution to the Syrian crisis. This was not opposed by either Russia or China and so Mr. Annan is trying to apply the same rules to the victims as well as the victimizers. It appears that this effort will be abandoned since so far  the level  of violence by the Syrian forces has not diminished, actually it has led to the most grotesque massacre in this conflict so far; Al Houla Massacre.

So where we and what are next in this conflict? The current government is illegitimate, it is a dictatorship that has failed to evolve and reform for over forty years, it has sought and obtained Iranian help in putting down the insurrection, it has used Russian and Chinese political protection to increase the frequency and ferocity of its military attacks against its own civilian population. It has taken advantage of the well meaning efforts by Mr. Annan in order to increase the level of violence and it has called on its Lebanese minions to expand the Syrian conflict into Lebanon so as to make the Syrian government’s warning that without Bashar regional instability will ensue a reality.

This is a regime that has never had any legitimacy, a regime that does not value personal freedom, a regime that survives by oppression and brutality a regime that is best described as a regime of human depravity. This regime must be held accountable for all its human right abuses over the past 14 months of this uprising as well as all its previous excesses against Hama, Kurds and all its political opponents. To argue that this regime must be negotiated with only because it has large guns is an insult to reason and rationality. Furthermore the efforts to justify a continuation of this regime on the ground that its level of brutality is not as grotesque as it is in some other dictatorships are ludicrous and actually contemptuous. And last but not least, as the world evolves and as cosmopolitanism spreads the circle of ethics widens from the self to the family then the tribe the state and eventually the world. That would then call for a universal right to protect against slavery, exploitation and flagrant violation of the most basic principles of human rights. The Syrian people are entitled to freedom of expression and self determination in an open and free election without having to fear the ghosts of the Assad secret services and their egregious acts.

Thursday, 19 April 2012

French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said that the U.N. observer mission in Syria would require between 300 and 400 people to oversee the country properly. (Reuters)

By Al Arabiya with Agencies

The UN Security Council has passed a resolution authorising the deployment of an advance team of monitors to Syria to oversee the ceasefire there.

A small group of observers has been poised to leave for Syria as soon as a resolution is passed. Correspondents say they could leave within hours.

The vote comes as a BBC reporter says the ceasefire appears to be in danger of collapsing in some parts of Syria.

Activists said violence in the restive city of Homs left several dead.

The resolution was passed unanimously after Russia approved a revised text, which authorised the deployment of a small advance party of observers.

Diplomats had revised a US-proposed draft on Friday to accommodate Russian objections. Russia had vetoed two previous resolutions on Syria.

The resolution calls for the deployment of an advance team of monitors. Additional approval will be required to increase the deployment to 250, the total which Mr Annan is seeking.

Meanwhile the BBC’s Jim Muir in Beirut, who has been monitoring developments in Syria, says that in parts of the country the ceasefire is in danger of collapsing, unless something is done to shore it up.

In Syria’s third biggest city of Homs, government forces have been pounding some quarters with tanks and rocket fire.

Activists say at least 17 people have been killed there and in other incidents, including at a funeral in Aleppo, where several people were reported shot dead by security forces.

By Jonathon Burch | Reuters – 1 hour 2 minutes ago

ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan accused the U.N. Security Council on Tuesday of indirectly supporting the “oppression” of the Syrian people by failing to adopt a united stance on Syria.

Once a friend of Damascus, Turkey has become a fierce critic of President Bashar al-Assad over his year-long crackdown on his opponents and has called for the Syrian leader to step down.

“In not taking a decision, the U.N. Security Council has indirectly supported the oppression. To stand by with your hands and arms tied while the Syrian people are dying every day is to support the oppression,” Erdogan said.

In February, the Turkish prime minister described a veto by permanent Security Council members China and Russia of a U.N. resolution on Syria as a “fiasco for the civilised world”.

Russia and China have vetoed two council resolutions condemning Assad for turning his army on civilians.

“We will not turn our backs on the Syrian people, we will not leave the Syrian people to their own fate,” Erdogan told a meeting of his ruling AK Party on Tuesday.

On Monday U.N.-Arab League peace envoy Kofi Annan told the 15-nation Security Council that Damascus had agreed to an April 10 deadline to withdraw all military units from towns to pave the way for a ceasefire with rebels two days later.

But Annan also told the council there had been no reduction in violence so far and Western envoys have expressed scepticism about Damascus’ intent to halt its assault on opponents.

Assad has repeatedly promised to stop his campaign against anti-government activists, which has brought the country to the brink of civil war, but the fighting has continued.

On Tuesday, Annan’s spokesman said an advance team from the U.N. peacekeeping department was expected in Damascus within 48 hours to discuss deployment of observers to monitor a ceasefire in Syria.

MISSING JOURNALISTS

Erdogan also said his government was working to secure the immediate release of two Turkish journalists who went missing in Syria just under a month ago.

“We are continuing our intense efforts in relation to the two Turkish journalists detained in Syria. We are continuing our efforts on every level to secure their immediate release and ensure their return to Turkey,” he said.

Reporter Adem Ozkose, who works for the Milat newspaper, and cameraman Hamit Coskun went missing early last month in Idlib province, just across the border from Turkey, Turkish media and activists said.

There have been media reports the two men had been detained by Syrian security forces although Ankara has not confirmed this and last month the foreign ministry said it was still seeking information on their whereabouts.

Erdogan did not say who had detained the pair.

Turkey’s Hatay province has become a staging post for reporters attempting to cross the border to cover the protests and fighting in nearby areas of Syria.

Such work has become increasingly risky. U.S. veteran war correspondent Marie Colvin and French photographer Remi Ochlik were killed during fighting in the city of Homs in February.

Some 20,000 Syrian refugees now live in camps in Turkey and about 400 more people flee across the border every day.

* Russia hedges its bets on Syrian leader Assad’s fate

* Moscow hopes to hold influence in diplomacy and Syrian transition

* For Putin, ensuring Russia’s voice is heard and curbing Western clout are crucial

By Steve Gutterman

MOSCOW, March 21 (Reuters) - One part public relations, one part cold calculation: Russia’s sharper tone toward Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is calculated to improve Moscow’s image after months shielding him from censure and ensure the Kremlin a strong diplomatic role regardless of whether he stays in power.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov took aim at Assad in an interview broadcast on Tuesday, saying Syria’s leadership had ignored Russia’s warnings and made “very many mistakes” that helped drag the country to the brink of civil war.

The tough tone is part of a growing Russian effort to distance itself from Assad, whose government is blamed by many Western and Arab countries for violence the United Nations says has killed more than 8,000 civilians since a crackdown on pro-democracy protests began in March 2011.

On Wednesday, Russia supported a U.N. Security Council statement backing U.N.-Arab League envoy Kofi Annan’s mission to end the violence, in a show of unity with the United States and Europe.

Moscow and Beijing had previously vetoed two Western-backed resolutions supported by Arab states.

“Clearly Russia doesn’t want to be seen as Assad’s last line of defence,” said Dmitry Trenin, director of the Carnegie Moscow Centre think tank.

Russia has not budged on its most adamant demand: that Assad must not be pushed out by foreign powers using the Security Council to promote “regime change”, as President-elect Vladimir Putin and other top officials say happened last year in Libya.

But the criticism, and support for the statement, are signs that Russia is hedging its bets about Assad’s fate and wants as strong a hand as possible in shaping Syria’s future in the event that he is forced out.

Putin may have calculated that a strong role in a peace settlement, and a chance for some sway in a post-Assad Syria, is worth more than close ties with a leader who could be doomed.

“Russia will not be focused on keeping Assad in power for the sake of keeping Assad in power,” said Trenin.

HIGH STAKES

The U.N. statement is not binding, and Moscow bought time for Assad by negotiating the removal of a specific one-week deadline for the government to comply with the council’s demands or face potential “further steps”, which Russia could block.

It also leaves plenty of room for Syria’s government and the Kremlin to blame Assad’s opponents for continued violence, and includes no direct call for Assad to step aside to make way for a political dialogue - a condition Russia said was unacceptable.

By cementing Annan’s central role in peace efforts, Russia may hope to keep the issue close to the United Nations, where it has veto power in the Security Council - and stem any efforts by Western and Gulf Arab nations to seize the initiative.

If Assad does go, Russia would face a huge challenge in winning over his opponents, angered by Russia’s refusal to push for his ouster and by its vetoes of two resolutions condemning his government for the bloodshed.

The stakes are high. Syria has bought billions of dollars worth of Russian arms and hosts a supply and maintenance facility on the Mediterranean coast that is Russia’s only military base outside the former Soviet Union.

The Kremlin may hope to steer Syria toward a transition with political change superficial enough to strengthen Moscow’s hope of maintaining strong ties with Syria, its firmest foothold in the Middle East.

The intensity of the conflict in Syria means the time when that was possible may have passed, said Fyodor Lukyanov, editor of the journal Russia in Global Affairs.

But he said that Russia had used its firm stance in recent months “to tell the West and Arab countries very clearly and decisively that … Russia’s position must be heeded.”

PUTIN FACTOR

That was crucial for Putin, who is now prime minister and returns to the Kremlin for a six-year presidential term in May.

Facing protests at home, he made accusations of U.S. and NATO meddling abroad a theme of his campaign, and had sharply criticised the March 2011 Security Council resolution that authorised NATO military intervention in Libya.

Russia let that resolution pass by abstaining. He accused NATO nations of overstepping their mandate and using the green light from the Security Council to back rebels who drove Gaddafi from power.

While Lavrov’s language was strong, Russia’s insistence that it is not backing Assad is nothing new. Russia has repeatedly said its stance has been driven by the desire to uphold international law, protect a sovereign state from outside interference and avert civil war, not by self-interest.

Putin rarely spoke of the Syrian conflict until recent weeks, and when he did it was to say that Assad was no ally and Russia had no special relationship with Syria.

In the radio interview, Lavrov displayed cool indifference to the man he met last month on a visit to Damascus.

Asked whether it would be better for Assad to resign and leave Syria for Moscow or Belarus than to end up hiding like Gaddafi, he said that “nobody is inviting him to Moscow” and that it was “up to Assad” and the Syrian people to decide his political future.

(Reuters) - Russia is counting on President Bashar al-Assad keeping his grip on power to see through potential arms contracts worth up to $6 billion (3 billion pounds) (3 billion pounds) and help Moscow reach a record defence export year, according to the CAST defence and security think-tank.

Russia has been Assad’s main defender as Western and Arab countries push for a U.N. Security Council resolution which would call for him to step down.

A veto-wielding permanent member, Russia has already criticised the resolution saying it will lead to civil war.

Having lost tens of billions of dollars in arms contracts with Libya after leader Muammar Gaddafi was ousted last year, Moscow is looking to Damascus to maintain a foothold, both politically and economically, in the region.

At stake for Russia, the world’s no. 2 arms exporter, is billions of dollars in potential and current arms contracts with ally Syria, including deliveries on an order of 24 MiG-29M2 fighter jets signed in 2007.

Syria, where Russia maintains a naval base, is also the only ally Russia has left in the Middle East.

“(If Assad goes) Russia will lose everything,” CAST Director Ruslan Pukhov said.

“Syria is one of Russia’s top five clients. Russia already concluded with Syria contracts for $4 billion and has $2 billion more potential contracts on the way,” Pukhov said.

Moscow-based CAST is Russia’s most respected defence and security think-tank. Although it has good relations with the government it is independent.

Tests for the jet fighters began in December of last year, CAST said in a report obtained by Reuters before publication. Damascus was also likely to receive deliveries of Buk anti-aircraft missiles this year, it said.

Russia delivered a record $12 billion in weapons in 2011, CAST said in an annual report released before official data, boosted by sales to embattled Arab leaders and Asian countries eyeing China’s rising military might.

Pukhov said while the funds are crucial for Russia’s defence industry, which Putin built up during his 2000-08 presidency and lacks enough domestic orders to keep it profitable, they have little bearing on Russia’s $1.85 trillion economy.

CAST said Damascus received eight percent of Russia’s 2011 deliveries or nearly $960 million in jet fighter upgrades and anti-ship missile systems.

NO. 2 ARMS EXPORTER

Western U.N. envoys who support the plan calling for Assad’s removal have already condemned arms sales to Damascus, where the United Nations says more than 5,000 civilians have been killed in a 10-month-old crackdown on opposition to Assad’s rule.

In addition to upgrades and repairs to Syria’s MiG-23 and MiG-29 fighter jets last year, it also received three different missile systems, including Bastion anti-ship missile units and another anti-aircraft missile system.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has said Moscow’s arms exports to Syria need no explanation. While European Union and U.S. embargoes prevent selling arms with Assad’s government, no international treaty with Russia is in place.

Russia has seen several years of record-breaking arms delivery growth, despite criticism that it is failing to deliver the technological benefits of Western suppliers or the low costs of emerging weapons exporter China.

Despite having signed $3.69 billion in new arms contracts in 2011, the total portfolio of Russia’s arms exporting monopoly Rosoboronexport shrank to $35 billion from a size of $38.5 billion in 2010.

“We expect that results of 2012 will show that Russian export of arms will exceed the mark of $14 billion. Looking at the current portfolio…that level of export may be supported for at least another three years,” the report said.

Rosoboronexport makes up around 80 percent of all arms exports in a given year, while nearly 20 independent firms make up the difference with sales of spare parts and upgrades.

Last year the top customer for Russian arms was India, whose arms ties extend to Soviet times and which received $2.5 billion worth of tanks and fighter jets as New Delhi ramps up its defences against China’s growing martial might.

(Reporting By Thomas Grove; Editing by Angus MacSwan)

The Russian press has been playing up the gratitude of the Syrian people for Moscow’s staunch opposition to foreign intervention against the regime of Bashar al-Assad.

Demonstrators against President Bashar al-Assad hold a placard that reads, “Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin says to Syria’s Assad, My cuddly murderer of his people.” (Reuters)

Demonstrators in Damascus and Aleppo sang Russia’s praises when Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov appeared in Syria on Feb. 7, and Russian TV and newspapers showed delirious crowds waving Russian flags. Ten days later, Syrians in Moscow staged a rally where they shouted, “Thank you, Russia! Thank you, Putin!”  

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has enjoyed playing the role of Syria’s protector and champion. But within the Russian community living in Damascus, the view is a bit darker.

“Our women are insulted out loud in some districts of Damascus,” Archimandrite Alexander, the Russian Orthodox Church’s representative there, told the Interfax news agency. “Sometimes taxi drivers deny a ride to Russian-speaking people. Even children can throw stones at people speaking the Russian language.”

There’s no doubt about where that attitude comes from.

“Russian citizens’ position in Syria deteriorated sharply after Russia vetoed the U.N. Security Council resolution on Syria,” Alexander said. “The so-called liberation army and radical religious groups intimidate them, blame them for the Syrians’ and their children’s deaths, and want them to leave.”

Russian citizens who can are getting out. The Russian Embassy school has closed, and Russian workers on a natural gas development project have been evacuated. Russian diplomats want to curtail services at St. Ignatius Church because of security concerns, though it still ministers to Russian servicemen who are alone now that their families have left.

And Damascus, said the archimandrite, is about the safest place in Syria. It’s a lot worse outside the city.

In the following video posted to YouTube, angry Syrians take to the streets to protest Russians in Aleppo, Syria’s largest city. Many chant: “The people want to topple the regime.”

Carcasses of buildings riddled with bullet holes, flattened cars and mountains of rubble are what’s left of a Homs neighborhood after an intensifying bombardment campaign in Syria that began in early February.

Baba Amr is rapidly disappearing.

“The neighborhood is a disaster,” said Sami Ibrahim, an activist in Homs for the Syrian Network for Human Rights who was contacted by phone. “The streets are demolished. Buildings, even schools have been destroyed. Families have to leave their homes.”

On Sunday, as Syrians went to the polls to approve a new constitution in the rest of the country, Homs came under almost near continuous bombardment by government forces, activists said. Sixty-four people died overnight and into Monday, including three children, all trying to flee the shelling, according to the Local Coordination Committee, another activist network based in Beirut.

Meanwhile, the United Nation’s top human rights body will call for Syria to end all attacks on civilians and allow aid groups unhindered access to Homs and other beleaguered areas, diplomats in Geneva said Monday.

The U.N. Human Rights Council hopes to prompt Syrian President Bashar Assad to end the killings by issuing a resolution Tuesday that condemns “widespread and systematic violations of human rights and fundamental freedoms by the Syrian authorities,” according to a draft obtained by the Associated Press.

Britain’s Foreign Office Minister Jeremy Browne also called for those responsible for serious crimes in Syria to be held accountable. He warned Russia not to veto the resolution. On Monday, Russia, Iran and Cuba were the only countries to openly object to the rights council’s plan to hold the urgent meeting Tuesday.

“I think the Russians are putting themselves on the wrong side of history,” Browne said. “Do they feel morally comfortable with that? What are they proposing to do about it?”

A Syrian official Monday accused the West of trying to destabilize the country for its own gain and warned that militarizing groups seeking to topple the country’s ruler is a big mistake that will backfire. Foreign Ministry spokesman Jihad Makdissi said that dialogue among all parties is the only way to end the conflict, which activists groups say has killed more than 8,000 people.

“The Assad army has shown it has a clear intention to destroy Baba Amr and its surroundings from the map, as it represents the Syrian revolution,” said an activist in Homs on her blog site who asked that she not be identified out of fear for her safety. “They have used every possible weapon on our small neighborhood.”

Pictures and videos taken by local activists and citizen journalists from the Syrian Network for Human Rights show very few buildings remaining intact. According to that group, 425 people have been killed and 1,800 injured in Baba Amr in the past 24 days.

Those who have survived are fighting for food and medical help, activists say. There has been very little flour for a week, and water is scarce. Medical supplies are at a minimum and medications rare.

The Syrian government has denied aid workers and the International Committee for the Red Cross from entering Baba Amr to bring in supplies, or to allow evacuation of the wounded since Friday. The Red Cross said a team of its workers was allowed into Homs on Monday.

“We cannot get into the neighborhood to give a single bit of medicine,” Ibrahim said. “And there are only two medical doctors working in the field hospital. The government doesn’t let anyone in or out.”

“We stopped trying to count the number of those killed and wounded,” said Abu Hanin, a citizen journalist/activist from human rights group Avaaz from Baba Amr. “It is very difficult to determine an exact figure, we cannot get to the places of the bombing, we do not know if people were able to escape from the destroyed buildings or if they are under the rubble.”

Over the border in Jordan, thousands of Syrians await word on the fate of their homes and relatives.

“We left because they shot our homes with rockets,” said Raja Juma’a, 25, of Baba Amr, who with her husband and seven children are crowded in Mafraq, a city in northern Jordan now home to many Syrian refugees.

Contributing: The Associated Press. Lynch reported from Amman; Clermont from Berlin.