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| Rebel victory would destabilize entire Middle East: Assad |
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 Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has warned that if foreign-sponsored rebels fighting against the government take power in his country they could destabilize the entire Middle East for decades.
The Syrian leader also criticized Turkey's “foolish and immature” leaders and Arab neighbors he said were arming and sheltering rebel fighters, Reuters reported on Saturday.
“If the unrest in Syria leads to the partitioning of the country, or if the terrorist forces take control... the situation will inevitably spill over into neighboring countries and create a domino effect throughout the Middle East and beyond,” he said in an interview with Turkish television.
Turmoil would spread “east, west, north and south. This will lead to a state of instability for years and maybe decades to come,” Assad said in the interview, posted by the Syrian presidency on the Internet.
“We are surrounded by a group of countries that help terrorists and allow them to enter Syria. Of course, not necessarily all these countries are doing it in special circumstances, and cannot control its borders,” he stated.
“In Lebanon, there are some different factions that help people who want to infiltrate Syria. Turkey’s government officially harbors terrorists and sends them into Syria. They’re also crossing over from Jordan,” Assad added.
Commenting on the Arab League, he stated that the Arab body has lost legitimacy since it no longer represents Arab people but Arab governments.
“The Arab League itself needs legitimacy; it’s a league that represents Arab countries, not Arab nations (people), and it lost its legitimacy a long time ago, because (Arab League) member states no longer represent their own people,” the Syrian president said.
On March 26, the Arab League handed Syria’s seat to the opposition, known as the National Coalition, during a summit held in the Qatari capital Doha.
The league also authorized its members to send all the means of what it called self-defense, including weapons, to militants.
The Syria crisis began in mid-March 2011. Many people, including large numbers of security personnel, have been killed in the violence, and several international human rights organizations say the foreign-sponsored militants have committed war crimes.
The Syrian government says the chaos is being orchestrated from outside the country, and there are reports that a very large number of the militants are foreign nationals.
The United Nations says at least 70,000 people have been killed in Syria's conflict. Daily death tolls of around 200 are not uncommon, monitoring groups say. More than a million refugees have fled the country and the Syrian Red Crescent says nearly four million have been internally displaced.
Neighboring Lebanon and Jordan are both struggling to cope with the flood of refugees, while the sectarian element of the conflict has also raised tensions in neighbors such as Lebanon and Iraq.
While accusing opponents of using “sectarian slogans”, Assad said the essence of the battle was between “forces and states seeking to take their people back into historic times, and states wanting to take their peoples into a prosperous future”.
He appeared to be referring to Saudi Arabia and Qatar, absolute monarchies which have supported efforts to arm the insurgents.
Assad said Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was recruiting fighters with Qatari money to wage war in Syria, but warned him that the bloodshed could not easily be contained. “The fire in Syria will burn Turkey. Unfortunately he does not see this reality,” Assad said.
Erdogan, he said, “has not uttered a single truthful word since the crisis in Syria began”.
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| Last Updated on 06 April 2013 20:21 |