Zaglul Ahmed Chowdhury Having reached the landmark accord on elimination of Syria's chemical weapons, the United States and Russia are now inching towards convening an international conference in Geneva late November in a bid to find a settlement of the Syrian civil war. The dialogue, dubbed as Second Geneva Conference, is likely to be held on November 23-24. All concerned are seeking to remove the obstacles that aborted a similar conference one year ago. One of the main problems is to ensure the participation of the Syrian opposition. The rebels are divided on the issue of talks which will be participated by the regime of President Bashar al-Assad. The Syrian conflict is increasingly becoming less volatile. This development has come as a relief. The current situation is a positive turn-about, creating the possibility of resolving the crisis through talks. This augurs well for the world as the spectre of a full-blown war centring Syria that looked almost inevitable sometime ago has now receded considerably. The peace process received another boost as the experts began the process of destroying the chemical weapons of Syria under the terms of a UN resolution. Earlier, a silver lining emerged in the Syrian scene, delaying an anticipated military strike by the United States against Damascus regime. The high-level negotiations between the United States and Russia, the main international backer of the Syrian regime, in Geneva resulted in the conclusion of the remarkable agreement on Syria's chemical weapons. US secretary of state John F. Kerry and his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov held complex talks and succeeded in reaching understanding on Syria's deadly weapons which helped avert an impending American military assault on Syria. The positive outcome came following Moscow's initiative to defuse the tensions as Russia seized the US proposal that the air and missile strike against the Damascus regime may be put on hold if Syria agreed to hand over the dangerous chemical weapons to international community. Moscow is steadfastly supporting the Assad regime, but welcomed Washington's overture that has also been agreed by Damascus authority. The last-minute Russian initiative caused US president Barack Obama to back away from the planned air strike against Syria. However, the US says that its readiness to attack Syria would remain in place while it wanted to give diplomacy a chance to avoid tough action against the Assad regime. Russia, which says that any American attack against Syria could be a catastrophe, hopes that the on-going discussions may help find a settlement of the larger Syrian tangle while accord has already been reached on Syria's chemical weapons. But because of myriad complexities, the efforts for reaching common ground on the resolution of the Syrian conflict through talks may prove quite difficult. Nonetheless, the understanding on chemical weapons has come as a major step forward towards settling the conflict. The United States was expected to launch the air and missile strikes in Syria, responding to alleged use of chemical weapons by Bashar al-Assad regime there, but withheld the assault after British parliament rejected Prime Minister David Cameron's proposal to strike Syria. Cameroon said he would respect parliament's will. President Obama, who fully supports the Syrian rebels, was initially unwilling to get his country involved in Syria but later veered towards attacking Syria. He, however, disapproved involving ground troops in the assault. He said the Syrian regime had crossed the "red line" by using chemical weapons against its own people and this warranted a tough American response. The US is haunted by the scars of long wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that were initiated by Obama's predecessor George Bush. Hence, most Americans are against getting involved militarily in another country. Beside, Obama is known to be seeking to get the US troops out from Afghanistan and Iraq. For him, involving US in Syria militarily contradicts his position. Nevertheless, Obama administration, probably, can not shy away from the challenge of attacking Syria as the issue appeared as the most critical one in his nearly five years' presidency. It is like a double-edged sword for him - acting against the will of most of the people at home and abroad and, on the other hand, "punishing" an errant autocrat for using gas in the 30-month-long civil war. The civil war that has claimed more than one hundred thousand lives in addition to displacing more than 1.5 million Syrians, most of whom have taken shelter in neighbouring Turkey and Jordan. . Now, significant progress has been made towards lessening the tensions centring Syrian crisis and the US has praised President Assad for his cooperation in implementing the accord. Russia and China are two key allies of Syria and exercised their "veto" in some anti-Assad resolutions earlier in the UN Security Council piloted by the Western nations. President Putin said that he would have supported the US actions against Syria if its culpability in using poison gas is fully established beyond any iota of doubt. Damascus and its allies, including Russia and Iran, say that the use of gas was done by the Syrian rebels and their backers, including Israel, as a pretext of foreign involvement in Syria. The US is under pressure from its Middle East allies like Israel, Saudi Arabia and Turkey to act against Assad. Syrian rebels are also mounting pressure on the foreign powers supporting them for stern measures against the Assad regime. The Arab nations, including Saudi Arabia and UAE, have announced more assistance to the Syrian rebels while Iran backs the Assad regime strongly. Although tension still persists centring Syria and the civil war remains far from being settled, dangerous possibility of the US getting directly involved militarily in Syria has now been greatly reduced. It is also a good sign that the accord on elimination of Syria's chemical weapons is being honoured by all sides and thus the apprehension that its implementation would hit snags has been belied. The international team of experts faces a massive task of destroying an estimated 1,000 tonnes of nerve agent sarin, mustard gas and other banned arms in about a dozen sites in Syria by mid-2014 in line with the UN resolution. President Assad had initially denied having such weapons under his possession, but admitted after more than 1,000 people were killed by the nerve gas at a Damascus suburbs. This infuriated the US and its allies, but the US-Russia talks brought them back from the brink of the war. Now, the focus of the Syrian tangle is on the coming international negotiation in Geneva that is likely to further de-escalate tensions centring the civil war. However, intensity of the fighting has not eased and the rebels announced the killing of a top military officer. The dead is Major General Jaama Jammal, the head of military intelligence, who has been killed in fighting with the rebels. His death has been confirmed by the Assad regime. However, the government said it would take part in the talks while the rebels are expected to take a decision on participation soon. zaglulbss@yahoo.com
Syrian crisis de-escalates
FE Team | Published: October 22, 2013 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00
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