The Middle East

Britain training rebels to assassinate Syrian president: report

As British Prime Minister David Cameron prepares to use the Royal Air Force (RAF) in Syria to put an end to the massacres the Syrian regime is committing throughout the country, British Special Forces are training rebels to assassinate the Syrian president and his commanders, the London Daily Star reported.

Al Arabiya,

13 November, 2012

UK government sources told the newspaper that British assassination squads are in Syria to train rebels on how to target President Bashar al-Assad and his warlords. Some troops hailing from Britain Special Air Service (SAS), Special Boat Section (SBS) and the Airborne Infantry of the British Army (Paras) are also in the country to teach Anti-Assad fighters techniques on the accurate use of weapons and explosives against Assad regime forces, the sources said.

Unlike the previous position of the United States and Western countries not to arm the Syrian rebels, U.S. president Barack Obama and Cameron are considering to intervene in Syria and to enforce a no-fly zone, the sources added.

Earlier this week, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad showed defiance when he appeared on Russian television warning against any intervention. Assad promised to take the fight till the end. “I’m Syrian, I was made in Syrian and I have to live in Syria and die in Syria,” he said.

During his visit to Syrian refugee camps in Jordan, Cameron urged the United States to pressure the international community to offer more help to Syrians who were forced to leave their country due to ongoing violence.

“Right here in Jordan I am hearing appalling stories of what has happened inside Syria and one of the first things I want to talk to Obama about is how we must do more to try and solve this crisis,” Cameron said.

Since March 2011, an overall death toll of more than 37,000 was recorded by the monitoring group, the Observatory of Human Rights. The New York Times said more than 20,000 members of the Syrian army have defected and joined the Free Syrian Army across the country.

France recognizes Syrian opposition coalition

France is the first of the European countries to fully recognize the Syrian opposition coalition as the "sole legitimate representative" of the Syrian people. Meanwhile the US calls it “a legitimate representative" but is yet to fully recognize it.

RT,

13 November, 2012

"I announce today that France recognizes the Syrian national coalition as the sole legitimate representative of the Syrian people and as the future government of a democratic Syria which will allow for an end to Bashar al-Assad's regime," President Hollande told a news conference in Paris.

On Sunday in Doha, Syrian opposition groups finally agreed to create a new leadership body united against President Bashar Assad. The coalition emerged after days of talks sponsored by foreign governments pushing for regime change in the embattled nation.

The US has also recognized the National Coalition of Forces of the Syrian Revolution and Opposition as “a legitimate representative” of the Syrian people but stopped short of describing it as the "sole" representative. Washington stressed that the nascent group must first demonstrate its ability to represent Syrians inside the country.

"We look forward to supporting the national coalition as it charts a course for the end of Assad's bloody rule, and marks the start, we believe, of a peaceful, just and democratic future for the people of Syria," US State Department spokesman Mark Toner said.

Hollande also said he would reconsider the question of arming the opposition.

“On the question of weapons deliveries, France has not supported the initiative as it has been unclear who would ultimately receive the weapons. As soon as there is a legitimate government formed by the coalition in Syria, France will once again look at this question,” he said.

France was also the first country to recognize the Libyan transitional government after the civil war which toppled Gaddafi.

The Arab League, however, has fallen short of giving full recognition. Both Iraq and Algeria have expressed reservations. The Arab League countries that have recognized the new coalition include, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman and Bahrain, countries which have been called a US-led ‘puppet group’ by some political commentators.

Meanwhile, Britain’s Guardian newspaper reports that Prime Minister David Cameron wants to end the 2011 EU arms embargo against all sides of the Syrian conflict in order to help the opposition oust Syrian regime.

The umbrella organization, called the National Coalition for Opposition Forces and the Syrian Revolution, will be made up of rebel groups in and outside Syria.

The Syrian opposition hopes that the formation of a more unified body will attract donations from the West and the Arab League, who have both bemoaned the lack of unity among Syrian rebels.

But Franklyn Lamb, an investigative journalist based in Beirut, told RT that the agreement reached by Syrian rebels was weak and they were pushed into an agreement by western powers.

“The reason that we have this tissue paper agreement was because of all the pressure that was put on them; they had to do something,” Lamb said.

The Syrian National Council (SNC), which is the main opposition group within the National Coalition for Opposition Forces, criticized the international community for its inaction, saying that fighters were in desperate need of weapons to break the stalemate with Assad’s forces.

Until the Doha agreement the SNC had refused to fully cooperate with other groups which make up Syria’s disparate opposition but its leader George Sabra, yielded to international pressure and signed an agreement with Moaz Khatib, the leader of the new coalition, which effectively relinquished control of the SNC to the new body.

France was also the first country to recognize the Libyan transitional government, during the civil war which toppled Gaddafi. Since Gaddafi was hunted down and murdered Libya has been in chaos with the government unable to reign-in the various militias, which still control parts of the country.

Foreign policy expert Conn Hallinan believes that France’s recognition of the Syrian opposition coalition signals a repetition of the Libyan scenario.

“By France stepping in and acting in this way, it is doing exactly what it did in Libya -which is that the UN passed a resolution instead of attempting to negotiate a peaceful resolution; the French started bombing three days after the UN Security Council passed its resolution,” he told RT.

“What’s happening in this case is that France is essentially intervening in this situation, it is supporting a group that basically says that there is no other solution but a military solution. It’s the worst thing that could happen.”

Arab League divided over

support of nascent Syrian

coalition

The Arab League fell short of unanimous support for the new Syrian opposition coalition. The body still lacks full recognition, some Arab nations reluctant to back the uprising against President Assad, whom they still view as a legitimate ruler.

RT,

13 November, 2012

The Arab League fell short of unanimous support for the new Syrian opposition coalition. The body still lacks full recognition, some Arab nations reluctant to back the uprising against President Assad, whom they still view as a legitimate ruler.

Arab foreign ministers showed the support of the nascent National Coalition of the Syrian Powers of Revolution and Opposition (NCSPRO) at a meeting in Cairo on Monday evening.

In an ambiguous statement the League called on the rest of the opposition “to join this national coalition so that it brings together all segments of the Syrian people,” but did not recognize it as Syria’s official representative. However, it did say the organization is now the “main interlocutor” with the Arab League.

Some of the League’s members, namely Iraq and Algeria had reservations about the new organization.

"Iraq's reservation was not clear but Algeria … asked for more time before the Arab League can start dialogue with the opposition coalition. Algeria also had a reservation on the fact that this coalition did not represent all the opposition factions," said an anonymous Arab League official to the press.

The states include Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman and Bahrain. The National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces emerged this Sunday after a Doha, Qatar, meeting of Syrian opposition groups. The group has pledged to set up a transitional government in Syrian once it has sufficient international backing.

The deal is the result of a relentless pressure from the US and its European and Arab allies, who want to see the current Syrian regime toppled.

Intervention could lead to war on ‘3 fronts’

However, mounting international pressure for the removal of embattled president Bashar Assad may only exacerbate political tensions, plunging Syria further into civil war.

British Labour MP Jeremy Corbyn warns that there is a danger that Syria could become the center for a proxy war on three fronts.

The conflicts with neighboring states could lead to an invasion of Syria by Western forces and a long-term civil war, Corbyn warns, stressing that the supporters of the Syrian government – of which there are a considerable number in Syria – would feel threatened and would therefore fight back.

“And the forces, a very desperate group of forces that has come together in the Syrian National Council would then be armed by the West in order to continue this war. It could get very long and very nasty with huge losses of life.”

What goes on in Syria is the business of Syrian people, asserts Lew Rockwell, chairman of the Ludwig Von Mises Institute. Calling the Arab League a “collection of corrupt dictatorships” and a US-led “puppet group,” he doubts whether it has the right to instruct Syrian people on who their representatives should be.

“The Arab League is a joke to anybody in the Arab World. They’re just again a tool… Of course they [are] the subsidiary of the Pentagon and of the CIA, this is part of the long-term plot by the US, by Britain, by France, by Turkey, by Israel to overthrow the last secular Arab government. They’re going to ‘Libyaze’ Syria, they want to destroy Syrian people.”

A ceasefire is the only solution for the humanitarian crisis in Syria, Corbyn believes.

“There’s a danger that Syria could become the center for a proxy war on three fronts, it’s terrifying for the people of Syria, so it does require political action by those who are supplying the arms, ” said Corbyn.

He added that Britain was moving closer to supporting the new umbrella opposition group as it already supports rebel groups with what it characterizes as “non-lethal” aid.

Although Assad “is not a good guy,” Syrian people do not want outsiders occupying and running their own country, Rockwell argues. 

 

“They fear these so-called rebels just as much as they fear their own government… They don’t want perpetual civil war as it happened in Libya with so many more deaths and so much more destruction,” Rockwell told RT.