US and Russia team up to make fresh diplomatic push on Syria
US Secretary of State Kerry and Russia's Foreign Minister Lavrov say they hope to convene an international conference on Syria later in May. The US has also stepped up humanitarian aid.
US Secretary of State Kerry and Russia's Foreign Minister Lavrov say they hope to convene an international conference on Syria later in May. The US has also stepped up humanitarian aid.
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After more than two years of escalating violence in Syria 鈥� including reports of chemical weapons use and the loss of an estimated 80,000 lives 鈥� the international community is spearheading a renewed diplomatic push to bring the conflict to an end.
Earlier this week, Secretary of State John Kerry met with Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov. The two announced their hope to organize an international conference on Syria later this month.
Lakhdar Brahimi, the United Nations envoy to Syria, called the planned conference 鈥渢he first hopeful news concerning that unhappy country in a very long time," Voice of America reported.
The US State Department also announced this week an additional $100 million in humanitarian aid to the estimated 1.4 million Syrians displaced by the drawn-out civil war. The money will be distributed through UN agencies to provide food, shelter, and healthcare in Jordan, Turkey, Lebanon, and Syria, according to the State Department.
This brings the US鈥檚 aid commitment to $510 million, according to the Los Angeles Times. 鈥淭he additional aid will help the Obama administration deflect criticism that it is not doing enough to deal with鈥� the confict in Syria, and is not related to the question of whether to arm rebels fighting President Bashar al-Assad鈥檚 regime, it reports.
But the flurry of activity this week to move toward a solution in Syria that does not include armed intervention has some questioning whether diplomatic channels alone can help end the protracted violence.
In an opinion piece for the Chicago Tribune, George Sabra,聽the acting president of the National Coalition for Syrian Revolution and Opposition Forces, notes that, 鈥淯.S. inaction is giving the Assad regime, after two years of wanton bloodshed, a green light to take even more outrageous steps to kill innocents.鈥� (Subscription required.)
Mr. Sabra, whose coalition is made up of various opposition groups and representatives from citizen councils in Syria, writes that Syrians want the fighting to end and the rebuilding of their nation to begin. He requests internationally enforced safe zones with protected airspace; follow-through from the US on its claims that the use of chemical weapons was a 鈥渞ed line鈥� or 鈥済ame changer鈥� in the conflict; and a diplomatic push to remove Assad from power.
Kerry, in Rome today, announced that the push for a political solution to the crisis in Syria would have to exclude President Assad in any transitional government, reports Agence France-Presse.
All sides of the conflict are working to "effect a transition government by mutual consent of both sides, which clearly means that in our judgement President Assad will not be a component of that transitional government," Kerry said.
But weakening Assad鈥檚 grip on power poses a difficult task. The BBC鈥檚 Middle East bureau chief Paul Danahar notes that the Assad regime 鈥渋ncreasingly thinks that by not losing it is winning,鈥� which has given it fresh conviction.
But Mr. Danahar also notes that the relative inaction of Western powers in Syria could come down to the lack of organization on the ground in Syria. Danahar likens the FSA to a more informal 鈥渕en with guns鈥� and very little unity or oversight.
An editorial in the Washington Post this week poses the question 鈥淲hat if the US doesn鈥檛 intervene in Syria?鈥�