Syria’s Assad says he won’t negotiate with ‘terrorists’ as US wants
Foreign ministers of countries opposed to Assad are due to meet in Paris on Monday to prepare for talks with Russian Federation and Middle Eastern countries in NY on Thursday with a specific focus on trying to form the opposition delegation for the peace talks.
But the Syrian leader’s close allies, Russian Federation and Iran, said his political fate should be up to Syrians to decide.
The organisation is under heavy pressure from other rebel groups and, especially, the United States and Saudi Arabia, to either break with Jabhat Al Nusra or convince that group to break with Al Qaeda.
“We appreciate Saudi Arabia’s leadership in convening this broad and representative group… who agreed today on the structure of their negotiating body to represent them”, he said. Saudi Arabia is hosting the meeting to try to unite the Syrian opposition before potential talks with the government of President Bashar al-Assad.
US Secretary of State John Kerry welcomed the declaration. It is a sign of how desperate the situation in Syria has become that USA officials are apparently willing to hold their noses and tolerate the presence of this group at peace negotiations.
For Karim Bitar of the Institute for worldwide and Strategic Affairs, “the apparent split in Ahrar al-Sham is a first sign that things could go wrong”.
Meanwhile, the Kremlin has sought to clarify Russian president Vladimir Putin’s remarks that Russia has been providing air support and weapons to the Western-backed Free Syrian Army (FSA).
In the meantime, opposition groups have been internally divided-with rival alliances battling for supremacy and control over territory-and a substantial portion of the fighting has been among them.
On 22 September 2014, the United States, Bahrain, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates began to strike targets of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) inside Syria, supporting moderate rebels.
The YPG has been the most effective partner on the ground in Syria for the U.S.-led coalition that is pounding Islamic State from the air.
To provide a civilian cover for these forces, various corrupt and aging exile politicians, many of them affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood, were also brought to Riyadh.
At the same time, Assad once again reiterated that his government is always open for negotiations with the real opposition – but emphasized that opposition must be defined.
During the closed-door talks between the various “rebels” and exiles, Ahrar al-Sham had reportedly objected strenuously to language in the agreement calling for “democracy” in Syria. They reiterated their position with respect to enlarging the coalition, and aggregated that there would be no discussions with Russian Federation until Moscow changes its strategy and stops targeting rebel forces. Assad added that recent terrorist attacks in Europe “are proof that what is going on” in Syria affects Europe as well.
The unusual display of unity was marred, however, by a walkout by the biggest and most radical of the rebel groups, Ahrar al-Sham, which objected to the role given to a Damascus-based opposition group and “other pro-regime personalities”, as well as the failure of the statement of principles to make reference to Syria’s “Islamic identity”, according to a statement issued by the group.
The demands that Assad and his lieutenants should play no part in a political transition marked a tougher stance than that of several Western countries which back Assad’s opponents.