sergei lavrov – Houghton STAR

As international delegates arrived in Geneva, Switzerland on Tuesday, January 21, doubts persisted concerning whether they would be able to bring an end to Syria’s three-year-old civil war.

Courtesy of radioaustralia.net.au — Courtesy of
radioaustralia.net.au

Sponsored by the United States, Russia, and the United Nations, the peace accords, known as “Geneva 2,” will bring together officials from Syrian president Bashar al-Assad’s government along with the Syrian National Council (SNC) an opposition bloc consisting of various groups seeking to overthrow the Assad regime. However, numerous groups engaged in the conflict have refused to attend, including many Islamist fighters who seek to turn Syria into an Islamic emirate. Complications further expanded as UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, under the lobbying influence of U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, withdrew an invitation to Iran, one of Assad’s main financial and materials supporters.

According to Reuters, Ban faced immense pressure from both Washington and the SNC, the latter threatening to boycott the talks and further obstruct any chances of conflict resolution. Moreover, Iran rejected the caveat that it had to accept the guidelines of a previous peace conference held in Geneva in 2012 that called for President Assad to step down and allow a transitional administration to take over. These peace talks failed after the U.S. and Russia could not agree on Assad’s post-conflict, political role. Washington Post reports that Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said excluding Iran is not a “catastrophe,” and said Russia and the other countries at the conference will still push for a productive dialogue between the warring factions.

Further complications arising as peace talks begin include the revelation of widespread torture and systematic killing committed by the Assad régime against 11,000 detainees in Syrian government custody. Al-Jazeera reports that thousands of photographs smuggled out of Syria and examined by a team of war crimes prosecutors and forensic experts show emaciated bodies marked with signs of brutal beatings, strangulation, and other forms of torture. The photographs were taken by a photographer for the military police who had secretly defected to the opposition. While both sides of Syria’s civil war have been accused of war crimes, this evidence is the most definitive proof of large-scale killing on the part of the régime to date. According to U.S State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf, one reason “Geneva 2” needs to be fruitful is because “the situation on the ground is so horrific that we need to get a political transition in place and…we need to get the Assad régime out of power.” Reuters reports that the former chief prosecutor of a war crimes tribunal for Sierra Leone, Desmond de Silva, commented that “some of the images we saw were absolutely reminiscent of people who came out of Belsen and Auschwitz.” It is not yet known how the revelations of these photographs will influence the demands of other negotiators, such as Russia, or the SNC.

Meanwhile, as “Geneva 2” begins, warfare continues in Syria. It is estimated that 130,000 people have died along with 22 million being displaced. Spillover from the conflict has also affected neighboring countries. In Lebanon’s capital, Beirut, a suicide bombing occurred in front of the headquarters of Hezbollah, a Shi’a group that actively assists Assad and militarily adheres to the Alawite offshoot of Shi’a Islam. Meanwhile, Iraq faces political strife as al-Qaeda-linked groups seek greater influence amongst the country’s Sunni population. Currently, Iraqi government forces and tribal fighters are trying to expel al-Qaeda fighters, staunchly opposed to Iraq’s Shi’a-dominated government, from the Sunni enclave in the country’s west. Consequently, as the conflict between Sunni-backed rebels in Syria and the Alawite-majority government continues, sectarian divides deepen further throughout the Middle East.

Hopes are rising as possible breakthroughs are underway in the deadlock gripping world powers concerning the Syrian civil war. This is a result of a possible United Nations resolution calling for international control of the Syrian government’s chemical weapons stockpile currently being considered.

Mideast_Syria-08c3c — Courtesy of www.washingtonpost.com

During talks at the recent G-20 meeting of the top twenty world economic powers, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said in an offhand comment that Syria’s president Bashar al-Assad could avoid American airstrikes if his government handed over “every single bit” of its chemical weapons stockpile to the international community. Later, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov stated that Russia had taken Kerry’s comments into consideration and would propose a “feasible, clear and concrete plan” that would focus on Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal.

After the deaths of over 1,400 civilians in a suburb in the Syrian capital Damascus on August 21, U.S. President Barack Obama threatened limited military strikes against the regime of President Assad as punishment. Obama, however, has mustered little international support as Britain, a close U.S. ally, voted against participating in airstrikes against Assad. French President Francoise Hollande supports military action against Syria, but is reluctant to intervene without greater support from the international community. Domestically, Obama faces an uphill battle in his bid to win congressional support before authorizing military strikes. After 12 years of war in Iraq and Afghanistan, many Americans oppose more involvement in another Middle Eastern conflict.

Some countries do support U.S. airstrikes in Syria. Saudi Arabia, a vocal critic of Assad and supplier of weapons to Syrian rebels, implored the Arab League to endorse airstrikes. Turkey, a one-time close ally of Assad but now a supporter of his overthrow, has also called for airstrikes. However, Russian President Vladimir Putin is a staunch opponent of outside intervention in Syria, warning of the serious consequences of what could follow if the U.S. follows through on its threats against Assad.

Syria is a main purchaser of Russian weaponry and is Moscow’s last Cold War-era ally in the Middle East. As a permanent member of the UN Security Council and with the power to veto any and all sanctions, Russia has rejected all Western-backed resolutions that condemn Assad’s regime and call for his resignation. Instead, Putin has called for dialogue between the Assad regime and the rebels seeking to overthrow him. Moscow also endorses the creation of a transitional government that includes Assad. Consequently, Washington and Moscow have been at constant odds over creating a unified international response to the Syrian civil war. Plans for peace talks in Geneva, Switzerland between the Syrian government and rebel officials collapsed and for much of the G-20 meeting the U.S. and Russia remained divided, particularly regarding airstrikes.

But with this potential resolution calling for Assad to hand over Syria’s chemical weapons, the permanent members of the Security Council, the U.S., Britain, France, Russia, and China, seem to be inching closer to an agreement. France is adding on to Russian proposals by calling for a clause that specifically condemns the chemical attacks. Assad, seeking to avoid potential U.S. airstrikes, has accepted the Russian resolution. If Assad fails to comply with the resolution, however, his regime will, again, face the threat of military strikes in consequence.

Since its beginning in March 2011, the civil war in Syria has claimed over 100,000 lives. Nearly a third of the country’s population has been displaced and millions of Syrians have fled abroad as refugees.