generalspeaking

Pushing Syria

Pushing Syria

"Of course, our opinions do not coincide, but all of us have the intention to stop the violence in Syria and to stop the growth of victims and to solve the situation peacefully, including by bringing the parties to the negotiating table in Geneva. We agreed to push the parties to the negotiating table."
Russian President Vladimir Putin

Mr. Putin preserves his position that there is no way that Russia will permit the West; NATO and the United Nations primarily, to push his ally Bashar al Assad out of governing Syria as its Alawite president, representing the interests of the Shia minority in the country. That the Sunni majority protested peacefully for months in a fairly low-key attempt to persuade President al Assad to give them equal status to the Shia demographic, earning for their reward a violent backlash is irrelevant.

Irrelevant too is the aerial and artillery bombing and strafing of civilian enclaves in Syrian towns and cities, taking a huge toll of the population. UN figures of over 90,000 dead in a little over two years of conflict are likely somewhat under-reported. Those wounded, the casualties, the millions of homeless made refugees within and without the country are simply the cost of doing war. And war, a virulent sectarian war, is what resulted from that first tentative protest seeking a measure of equality.

Mr. Putin knows all about that kind of response to opponents; he exercised his own level of violence against those who exercised the unwise temerity to challenge his own rule as President-for-life and caliph of countless extravagances enriching himself and his colleagues in the process of administering his now energy-rich geography. A condition that makes those who own those riches comfortable, confidently persuasive, resolute against outside pressure.

"We do have different perspectives on the problem, but we share an interest in reducing the violence, securing chemical weapons and ensuring they are neither used nor are they subject to proliferation, and that we want to try to resolve the issue through political means, if possible."
American President Barack Obama

Mr. Obama practices diplomatic tact. He hasn't asserted, as did Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper that there is disagreement between the seven members of the G8 whose opinion of the Syrian regime is completely counter to Mr. Putin's. While agreeing to disagree about Bashar al Assad, about Iran, about Hezbollah, the two leaders have agreed they will hold a U.S.-Russia summit in Moscow in September.

As for chemical weapons, they have evidently been used on a number of occasions. Despite Mr. Putin's assertion that there is no hard proof. France, Britain and the United States have verified through independent investigation that there is indeed ample proof of their use. So it's a toss-up as to what is more atrocious; a regime's gassing of its own population or a rebel commander filming himself mutilating an enemy corpse.

The two world leaders will at the time  of their September meeting, "discuss in greater detail the full range of bilateral and international issues", and Syria will simply disintegrate further, and more lives will be lost, greater brutality be seen on YouTube, and the reciprocal sectarian hatred will fester even deeper, if such is possible. All in good time, however, diplomacy cannot be rushed, even though death-dealing can and will be.

President Putin warns that Europe will "pay the price" should it arm Syrian rebels. And in an interview with Germany's Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, President al Assad adds to that warning: "If the Europeans deliver weapons, then Europe's backyard will become terrorist, and Europe will pay the price for it."

Labels: Atrocities, Chemical Weapons, Conflict, G-8, Human Rights, Revolution, Russia, Syria, United States

posted by Pieface @ Tuesday, June 18, 2013