By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS | 9 December 2024 (IDN) — The overnight ouster of Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad, who fought a relentless battle against home-grown rebels, has generated a positive but cautious response from the highest echelons of the United Nations.
In a statement immediately following Assad’s ouster on December 8, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said: “After 14 years of brutal war and the fall of the dictatorial regime, today the people of Syria can seize an historic opportunity to build a stable and peaceful future”.
The future of Syria, he pointed out, is a matter for the Syrians to determine, “and my Special Envoy will be working with them towards that end”.
“We will need the support of the international community, said Guterres, “to ensure that any political transition is inclusive and comprehensive and that it meets the legitimate aspirations of the people of Syria, in all their diversity. Syria’s sovereignty, unity, independence and territorial integrity must be restored.”
Speaking to reporters December 8, UN Special Envoy for Syria Geir O. Pedersen, said “obviously, today it’s really a watershed moment in the history of Syria. It’s a nation that has endured 14 years nearly of relentless suffering and unspeakable loss”.
“And let me once again extend my deepest solidarity to all who have borne the weight of death, destruction, detention, and untold human rights violations. This dark chapter has left deep scars, but today we look forward with cautious hope to the opening of a new time—one of peace, reconciliation, dignity, and inclusion for all Syrians”.
To those displaced, he said, this moment renews the vision of returning to homes once lost. To families separated by war, the beginning of reunions bring hope. To those unjustly detained, and the families of the detained and the missing, the opening of the prisons reminds us of justice’s eventual reach.
Changes ahead remain immense
But the challenges ahead, he warned, remain immense and “we hear those who are anxious and apprehensive. Yet this is the moment to embrace the possibility for renewal in Syria. The resilience of the Syrian people offers a path forward to a united and peaceful Syria”.
Sarah Leah Whitson, Executive Director of the Washington-based Democracy for the Arab World Now (DAWN), said the dramatic collapse, however overdue, of the Syrian regime reflects first and foremost how rotten to the core it was; millions of Syrians will celebrate the demise of this hated, oppressive regime.
“One can only hope that the Syrian people will gain a measure of freedom and democratic rule, rather than a new dictatorship controlled by foreign forces, to replace Assad. The international community should seek to hold Assad and his cronies accountable for their heinous abuses against their own citizens,” said Whitson.
“The U.S. government should avoid interfering to support any armed groups in the country and immediately move to lift the country-wide sanctions on the country that have caused so much economic suffering in the country.”
Nihad Awad, National Executive Director, Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), congratulated “the Syrian-American community, the liberated people of Syria, the Muslim world, and everyone who cares about justice and freedom on the downfall of the brutal and murderous Assad regime.”
“We thank God for this historic, miraculous arrival of freedom after decades of brutal oppression against the Syrian people. We pray that the Syrian people succeed in establishing a representative government that upholds justice for all its citizens, advances just policies across the region and serves as a beacon of inspiration for other oppressed people around the world.
“We encourage the incoming Trump administration to make plans to phase out the unauthorized presence of U.S. troops in Syria, turn over occupied land to the Syrian people and ensure that neither our government nor the lawless Israeli government undermines democracy-building in Syria or otherwise interferes with Syrian sovereignty.”
Since the start of the Syrian revolution in 2015, CAIR has expressed support for the Syrian people, condemned the Assad regime’s war crimes, and called for the international community to take action to protect civilians from harm.
Raed Jarrar, DAWN’s Advocacy Director, said the United States should immediately withdraw its troops from Syria and refrain from meddling in Syrian domestic politics.
“The U.S. should also instruct Israel to refrain from using U.S. weapons to interfere in Syria, in light of reports indicating multiple Israeli airstrikes in Syria, which risk further destabilizing the region.
According to Steve Rosenberg, BBC Russia editor, Moscow is trying to find a language and continue a dialogue with Syria’s new leadership, and its future relationship with them.
Russia’s big concern, he said, is the fate of its two military bases—the Khmeimim air base and a naval facility at Tartus, both on the coast—both of which have given Moscow a foothold in the eastern Mediterranean in the last few years.
Even though Moscow had supported Bashar al-Assad for nine years and sent him military assistance to shore him up and keep him in power, now that he’s been toppled, Russia is trying to find a dialogue with the new leadership in Syria.
“Russia is now stressing that all along they have wanted a political settlement of this crisis.
What’s interesting here is that until very recently, the Russian media was referring to what it’s calling the “armed opposition in Syria” as “terrorists”. That word has gone out of reporting here and they are now being called the “armed opposition” or “opposition”, he noted. [IDN-InDepthNews]
Photo source: Anadolu Ajansi