http://rt.com/news/lavrov-un-resolution-syria-409/
http://rt.com/news/syria-chemical-un-resolution-356/
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/syria-rebels-reject-opposition-coalition-call-islamic-leadership-092503945.html
This keeps happening, with efforts to bury a war authorization in the disarmament deal blocked by Russia, andWestern nations seemingly backing down before coming back with the same plan again.
A Syria resolution drafted by Russia and the US is in line with the earlier agreement in Geneva and does not suggest immediate action under Chapter 7 of the UN Charter, Russia’s FM Lavrov said. The Security Council is set to discuss the draft shortly.
“The resolution which will be submitted to the UN Security Council is in line with the Geneva framework on the destruction of chemical weapons in Syria,” Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told the press on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly's 68th session. “There will be no enforcement in line with Chapter 7.”
The draft resolution backs the agreement reached in Geneva regarding Syria's commitment to place its chemical weapons stockpile under international control. If there is any violation by any party – as the resolution also calls on the opposition to assist in the disarmament process – the Security Council will convene again and will be ready to take any enforcement measures in line with Chapter 7, Lavrov said.
“We have finalized the draft which will be submitted at the headquarters of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons in the Hague any minute now," Lavrov said in a short statement on Thursday evening. "We have also agreed on a US-Russian draft resolution which will be submitted to the Security Council later tonight.”
The draft resolution emphasizes the need to rely on the professionalism of the OPCW experts and calls on the UN Secretary General to assist the experts in the implementation of the reached agreements. It further outlines the obligations the Syrian side should fulfill as a member of the Chemical Weapons Convention and the party who invited the international personnel to take control of and ultimately destroy the country's chemical weapons stockpiles, Lavrov said.
The UN Security Council is expected to hold a closed-door consultation on the Syria draft resolution on Thursday evening, representatives of the French UN mission told Reuters.
US envoy to the UN Samantha Power also confirmed an agreement with Russia has been reached, elaborating further that the draft resolution is “legally obligating Syria to give up chemical weapons they used on their people.”
http://rt.com/news/syria-chemical-un-resolution-356/
Russia has enough evidence to assert that homemade sarin was used on August 21 in a chemical attack near Damascus, the same type but in higher concentration than in an Aleppo incident earlier this year, Russian FM Sergey Lavrov said.
“On the occasion of the incident in the vicinity of Aleppo on March 19, 2013 when the United Nations, under the pressure of some Security Council members, didn’t respond to the request of the Syrian government to send inspectors to investigate, Russia, at the request of the Syrian government, investigated that case, and this report, i.e. the results of this investigation are broadly available to the Security Council and publicly,” Lavrov said.
“The main conclusion is that the type of sarin used in that incident was homemade. We also have evidence to assert that the type of sarin used on August 21 was the same, only of higher concentration.”
The minister said he had recently presented his US counterpart John Kerry with the latest compilation of evidence, which was an analysis of publicly available information.
“The reports by the journalists who visited the sites, who talked to the combatants, combatants telling the journalists that they were given some unusual rockets and munitions by some foreign country and they didn’t know how to use them. You have also the evidence from the nuns serving in a monastery nearbywho visited the site. You can read the evidence and the assessments by the chemical weapons experts who say that the images shown do not correspond to a real situation if chemical weapons were used. And we also know about an open letter sent to President Obama by former operatives of the CIA and the Pentagon saying that the assertion that it was the government that used the chemical weapons was a fake.”
Lavrov emphasized that Russia stands fully committed to implementing the Geneva framework of September 14, a bilateral agreement with the United States to move forward with the destruction of Syrian chemical weapons stockpiles under the Chemical Weapons Organization’s supervision.
The foreign minister, however, reminded that the agreement did not suggest adopting any UN resolution that mentions immediate UN Chapter 7 measures against Syria, or rather the potential for the use of military force.
“We set in that framework which we agreed in Geneva that we would be very serious about any violation of the obligations under the Chemical Weapons Convention, we would be very serious about any use of chemical weapons by anyone in Syria and that those issues would be brought to the Security Council under Chapter 7.”
UN resolution within two days?
The draft resolution to back Syria’s disarmament could be finalized “very soon,” possibly “within the next two days,” Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov told the AP.
Although the text of the resolution will include a reference to Chapter 7 of the UN Charter, Gatilov stressed there will be “no automaticity in engaging” in military or non-military actions without a separate discussion at the UN Security Council.
The five permanent members of the Security Council have yet to agree on a final text of the resolution, though the group has indicated significant progress is being made.
Russian news agency Interfax rebutted earlier reports on Wednesday made by Western news agencies that claimed that a deal between the United States, Russia, France, China and Britain on wording of the draft resolution on destruction of chemical weapons in Syria had been reached.
"The alleged report claiming that five Security Council agreed on the main part of the resolution on Syria is not true. The Russian delegation was extremely surprised by the appearance of such information," a source from the Russian delegation told Interfax.
"This is just their wishful thinking," the spokesman for Russia's UN delegation said. "It is not the reality. The work on the draft resolution is still going on," quoted Reuters.
Earlier AFP and Reuters had reported that three Western diplomats speaking on condition of anonymity indicated that the permanent members of the Security Council had agreed on a new proposal.
"It seems that things are moving forward," one source told Reuters, adding that there was "an agreement among the five on the core." "We are closer on all the key points," he said.
The envoys told AFP that the draft resolution would allow for sanctions under Chapter 7 of the UN charter to be considered if President Bashar al-Assad fails to keep to a Russia-US disarmament plan.
On Tuesday, on the sidelines of the UNGA US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov held a “constructive” meeting and agreed to continue pushing towards destruction of chemical weapons held by all sides in Syria under international supervision.
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/syria-rebels-reject-opposition-coalition-call-islamic-leadership-092503945.html
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Powerful Syrian insurgent units have rejected the authority of the opposition Syrian National Coalition (SNC), badly damaging efforts by Western-backed political exiles to forge a moderate rebel military force on the ground.
Thirteen groups, including at least three previously considered part of the coalition's military wing, the Free Syrian Army (FSA), signed a statement calling for the opposition to President Bashar al-Assad to be reorganised under an Islamic framework and to be run only by groups fighting inside Syria.
The signatories range from hardliners such as the al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front and Ahrar al-Sham battalions to more moderate Islamist groups such as the Tawheed Brigade and Islam Brigade.
"These forces feel that all groups formed abroad without having returned to the country do not represent them, and they will not recognise them," said the statement read in an online video by Abdulaziz Salameh, the political leader of the Tawheed Brigade.
"Therefore the National Coalition and its transitional government led by Ahmad Tumeh do not represent them and will not be recognised," he said.
Western powers and their Gulf Arab allies had encouraged the SNC to lead a credible force within Syria under the FSA's banner and undercut Islamist militant groups piling into the conflict.
This effort to find a partner which the West and its allies could then back with weapons supplies could collapse if the rebel signatories hold their position - some groups have previously backed away from statements with hardline forces.
"If the statement proves to accurately represent the groups mentioned and they do not immediately fall apart again, it is a very big deal," wrote analyst Aron Lund on the blog Syria Comment.
"It represents the rebellion of a large part of the 'mainstream FSA' against its purported political leadership, and openly aligns these factions with more hardline Islamist forces."
CHRONIC INFIGHTING
Since the 2-1/2-year-old revolt against Assad began, Syria's opposition forces have been riven with factionalism and rivalries. There have also been tensions between Islamist groups and those that support a secular vision for a post-Assad Syria.
Charles Lister of IHS Jane's Terrorism and Insurgency Centre said the three moderate Islamist groups which signed the statement - the Tawheed Brigade, the Islam Brigade and Suqor al-Sham - had represented SNC's main rebel presence on the ground.
"The inclusion of the core of the SNC force...effectively depletes the SNC's armed wing, the Syrian Military Council," Lister said. "It is likely that the moderate Islamist coalition has ceased to exist as a single organisation structure."
Islamist forces grew in power as the Syrian conflict changed from peaceful protests into an armed insurgency after a fierce crackdown by Assad's forces. Militant groups, some linked to al Qaeda, have become even stronger in the ensuing civil war.
Many Islamist groups that do not share al Qaeda's ideology had maintained a pragmatic stance. But the statement indicates that Tawheed and others have closed ranks with hardliners on the ground rather than the Western- and Gulf-backed SNC abroad.
"These forces call on all military and civilian forces to unite under a clear Islamic framework based on Sharia law, which should be the sole source of legislation," the statement said.
One of the most radical groups fighting in Syria, al Qaeda's Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, was not involved in the statement, although it was not immediately clear if that was its own choice or because the other groups deliberately excluded it.
Whatever their ideological background, many opposition groups inside Syria are sceptical and resentful of the SNC, a fractious umbrella organisation for opposition groups abroad.
Critics accuse it of not being transparent with funding and in its political processes. They say it is out of touch with people in Syria, where more than 100,000 have been killed and swathes of territory have been destroyed by combat and shelling.
and....
Cracks Widen Among Syrian Rebels
by Shelly Kittleson, September 25, 2013
AD-DANA, Idlib Province, Syria, Sept. 24 2013 (IPS) – Scorching flames from a makeshift oil refinery sting eyes and the fumes choke throats near the top of a hill in northwestern Syria, where Free Syrian Army (FSA) fighters gather for fuel, coffee and phone calls as darkness falls.
The population of the nearby town Al-Dana has swelled by “tens of thousands” over the past two years, one FSA fighter from the area told IPS, as many fled closer to the border from areas under more frequent attack.
This hill had been covered with trees before last winter, when inhabitants and the internally displaced were forced to cut them for fuel to keep warm. It now bears only rocks and stumps, but remains one of the few places in the area where a cell phone signal can be picked up.
A shopkeeper from the area who is active in the Farouq Brigades, one of the largest units of the FSA, said that when the Islamic State of Iraq, an Islamist group active in Iraq and Syria and Al-Sham (ISIS), an al-Qaeda linked organization, set up checkpoints in the town and took over the area, all the shops were forced to shut down at prayer times. Punishments for crimes had grown in severity, he said.
He stressed, though, that we have “bigger problems to deal with right now.”
Another local person mentioned that the fundamentalist groups tended to occupy areas already taken by other anti-regime brigades, implying that they leave the tougher battles to others.
Many FSA fighters IPS spoke to in the Aleppo and Idlib regions in recent days said that their plan was that after the Assad regime fell, the more fundamentalist groups would be dealt with. A few even said they expected a full-blown war against them afterwards.
An early sign of this came on Sept. 18, when heavy fighting broke out in the northern town of Azaz between an FSA brigade and ISIS, reportedly after one of the Al-Qaeda affiliate’s fighters was filmed in a clinic by a German aid worker.
When this IPS correspondent crossed the town north of Aleppo a few days before, rubble from over two years of shelling and strikes was visible on the streets. Several armed foreign fighters locally known simply as ‘muhajiroun’ were clearly around.
However, this female correspondent – traveling in a vehicle with the commander of a small fighting unit – was easily waved through an ISIS checkpoint just outside of town.
As air strikes and shelling by the regime continue unabated, fighting between anti-regime factions is siphoning off ever more time, attention and manpower from FSA forces stretched preciously thin. Following the outbreak of fighting in Azaz, Turkey closed the nearby Oncupinar border gate indefinitely, thereby choking off the lifeline that had previously enabled humanitarian aid in, and refugees out.
In Ad-Dana, one fighter noted that until four months ago he had continued to go to regime-held Idlib city using a fake ID to pass regime checkpoints in order to pick up his government check as a secondary school English teacher. He still teaches part-time, but it has now become too dangerous to cross enemy lines to gain much needed cash, while basic goods grow ever more scarce.
Despite soaring costs, unremitting shelling and the over 100,000 deaths in some two and a half years of fighting, the FSA rebels gathered nevertheless expressed guarded optimism.
“We’re flying,” said Aref Najjar, a former government employee. He told IPS he had spent five years in prison on trumped-up charges after refusing to travel to join the funeral of former president Hafez Al-Assad.
“They kept us under the table for so long, but once you see what is on the table, you will fight.”
Given the danger, many of the fighters especially from the southern reaches of the province have moved women and children in their families across the border into Turkey.
Mohammad’s 19-year-old wife initially stayed with him in his family home, which has been half destroyed by regime shelling, but she joined his family who had crossed the border into Turkey after the rape of women in neighboring villages by regime troops and Assad’s irregular shabiha militias became more frequent.
The 25-year-old antiaircraft expert faulted the rebels for not taking advantage of defected officers’ experience, and for making numerous mistakes as a result. He also noted that of the 80 men he had under his command only 40 currently had Kalashnikovs, and that only fundamentalist groups were able to attract funding.
A few months earlier he decided to grow a beard in the Salafi manner in a bid to raise funds, but continues to smoke and eagerly whips out a picture of himself from earlier this year: shaved and smiling, sporting sunglasses, jeans and a bright red t-shirt.
He told IPS he admired the fundamentalist groups for their “bravery”, citing a number of important gains they had made such as taking the strategic Menagh air base in August after a year-long siege by FSA brigades had proved inconclusive.
Alarm has been brewing for some time among activists, however, and one Syrian journalist noted that “the safest place during an air strike on the ‘liberated areas’ is the ISIS headquarters. People run there because they know the regime won’t hit them,” implying that the most fundamentalist groups are actually collaborating with the regime.
Fighters on the ground, though, tread more carefully. “If foreign fighters come to help Syrians,” said one, “I’m thankful to them.”
Chemical weapon resolution stalled again....
and....
Chemical weapons held by all sides in Syria should be destroyed – Lavrov
During a “constructive” meeting on the sidelines of UNGA, US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov have agreed to continue pushing towards destruction of “all” chemical weapons in Syria under international supervision.
“There are some serious concerns that the Syrian opposition may possess components of chemical weapons,” Lavrov told the press after the meeting with his counterpart. “All chemical weapons must be destroyed in Syria including hazardous materials in possession of the opposition,” he was quoted by Interfax.
Lavrov also stressed that work on the UN Security Council resolution on Syria will be conducted “within a framework that had been agreed between Russia and US in Geneva.”
Lavrov also stressed that work on the UN Security Council resolution on Syria will be conducted “within a framework that had been agreed between Russia and US in Geneva.”
Russia hopes that the UN Security Council resolution on Syria’s chemical weapons will be adopted immediately after the decision of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons in the Hague in the coming days.
"The talks were productive. We have a common understanding of how to move forward,” Lavrov said. He also stressed that "the OPCW plays a major role in these matters." His counterpart John Kerry agreed saying, “we had a very constructive meeting.”
"We are proceeding based on facts. And the facts are that the Syrian government has signed the Convention on the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, immediately expressed its willingness to meet its obligations under this document and provided a declaration to the OPCW on their stockpiles of chemical weapons and their locations," the Russian Foreign Minister said.
According to Lavrov, the sideline discussions with Kerry touched on many issues, but the main topic of discussion was the UN Security Council resolution in support of the OPCW decision.
One of the main sticking points is a possible Security Council resolution that would include possibility of the use of force under Chapter 7 of the UN Charter. Russia as well as China have continually opposed the inclusion of any such reference in a draft UN resolution.
Meanwhile, UN chemical weapons inspectors are to return to Syria on Wednesday to continue their mission, says Russia.
“We are satisfied that our persistent calls for the return of the UN inspectors for an investigation of the previous episodes have finally borne fruit,” Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov told the Russian parliament.
The experts were sent to investigate several cases of alleged use of chemical weapons, but their work was disrupted by the August 21 attack, which killed an estimated 1,400 people. The team was redirected to the location of the new incident to conduct a probe and produce an intermediate report on it.
But Moscow is unhappy with the direction the US is steering the Russian-brokered plan to dismantle the Syrian stockpile of chemical weapons.
“US officials compromised on chemical weapons, but they continue talking about how ‘the Syrian regime’, as they call it, is guilty of the use of chemical weapons without providing comprehensive proof. They constantly voice reservations that the plan to punish Damascus up to a military intervention is still in power,” he said.
Russia criticized the intermediate report presented at the UN last week, which some Western countries took as blaming the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad for the attack. Moscow says the evidence is not conclusive and argued that a more comprehensive assessment of the situation would prove that Syrian rebels could have been involved in both this and previous attacks.
and....
UN Syria Resolution Stalled Again, US Back to Seeking Military Action
Disarmament Plans Continuing Without UN Security Council
by Jason Ditz, September 24, 2013
For the third time this month, a UN Security Council resolution on Syria’s disarmament has stalled for the exact same reason, that the US and its allies are again pushing for the resolution to include an authorization to use military force.
This keeps happening, with efforts to bury a war authorization in the disarmament deal blocked by Russia, andWestern nations seemingly backing down before coming back with the same plan again.
President Obama even made the plan the centerpiece of his UN General Assembly speech today, and officials are indicating that Russia’s position hasn’t changed, so the plan is still seemingly farfrom completion.
In the meantime, Syria’s disarmament is going to have to continue without the UN Security Council having a resolution in place. Syria has already ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) and delivered their accounting on the arms to the OPCW. Inspectors are scheduled to return Wednesday, suggesting the whole process might be able to go on just fine without the resolution.
No comments:
Post a Comment