Assad says will die in Syria;opposition meets in Doha
08/11/2012
DOHA, (Reuters) - President Bashar al-Assad scotched any suggestion he might
flee Syria and warned that any Western military intervention to topple him
would have catastrophic consequences for the Middle East and beyond.
Speaking in an interview with Russia Today (RT) television to be broadcast
on Friday, Assad said he did not see the West embarking on a military
intervention in Syria and said the cost of such action would be unbearable.
"I think that the cost of a foreign invasion of Syria - if it happens -
would be bigger than the entire world can bear ... This will have a domino
effect that will affect the world from the Atlantic to the Pacific," he
said.
"I do not believe the West is heading in this direction, but if they do,
nobody can tell what will happen afterwards," he added. The remarks were
published in Arabic on Russia Today's web site. It was not clear when Assad
gave the interview.
Assad's defiant remarks coincided with a landmark meeting in Qatar on
Thursday of Syria's fractious opposition to hammer out an agreement on a new
umbrella body uniting rebel groups inside and outside Syria amid growing
international pressure to put their house in order and prepare for a
post-Assad transition.
The United States and other Western powers have grown increasingly
frustrated with the opposition over divisions and in-fighting which have
undermined the chances of ousting Assad.
Backed by Washington, the Doha talks underline Qatar's central role in the
effort to end Assad's rule as the Gulf state, which funded the Libyan revolt
to oust Muammar Gaddafi, tries to position itself as a player in a
post-Assad Syria.
"I am tougher than Gaddafi," Assad told his interviewer, according to a
tweet posted by the editor-in-chief of the station.
'LIVE AND DIE IN SYRIA'
Assad, who is battling to put down a 19-month old uprising against his rule,
said he would "live and die in Syria", in what appeared to be a rejection of
the idea by British Prime Minister David Cameron this week that a safe exit
and foreign exile could be one way to end the civil war in Syria.
"I am not a puppet and the West did not manufacture me in order that I leave
to the West or any other country. I am Syrian, I am Syrian-made, and I must
live and die in Syria," he said. Russia Today's web site showed footage of
him speaking in the interview and walking down the stairs outside a white
villa.
Two civilians, a woman and a young man, in Turkey's Hatay border province
were wounded by stray bullets fired from Syria, according to a Turkish
official. Turkish forces increased their presence along the frontier, where
officials have said they might seek NATO deployment of ground to air
missiles.
Syria's war, in which the opposition estimates 38,000 people have been
killed, raises the spectre of wider Middle Eastern sectarian turmoil and
poses one of the toughest foreign policy challenges for U.S. President
Barack Obama as he starts his second term.
International and regional rivalries have complicated efforts to mediate any
resolution to the conflict. Russia and China have vetoed three U.N. Security
Council resolutions that would have put Assad under pressure.
Regionally, Sunni Muslim Arab countries and Turkey oppose Assad while
non-Arab Shi'ite Iran is backing the Alawite ruler, whose sect is an
offshoot of Shi'ite Islam and whose family has been in power for over 40
years.
The main opposition body, the Syrian National Council (SNC), has been
heavily criticised by Western and Arab backers of the revolt as ineffective,
run by exiles out of touch with events in Syria, and under the sway of the
Muslim Brotherhood.
Britain's Cameron said after Obama's re-election this week that the crisis
would be among the first topics the two leaders would discuss and that
efforts had so far been inadequate.
Foreign Minister William Hague said Britain will now talk directly to Syrian
fighters inside, after U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton last week
slammed the SNC, saying the Qatar meeting should create a body that includes
people fighting on the ground.
MEETING IN TROUBLE
But the plan to unite opposition groups ran into trouble almost as soon as
it was put on the table by SNC member Riyadh Seif. The initiative would
create a body that could eventually be considered a government-in-waiting
capable of winning foreign recognition and therefore more military backing.
"It's a consultative meeting, we will discuss all issues including forming
some kind of authority to manage the liberated areas," SNC head Abdulbaset
Sieda told reporters in Doha, before the meeting began behind closed doors
in a five-star hotel.
The meeting has so far been bogged down by arguments over the SNC
representation and the number of seats the rival groups - which include
Islamists, leftists and secularists - will have.
Qatar's Prime Minister Hamad bin Jassim was due to speak at the meeting
later on Thursday, signalling pressure on the Syrian opposition to get their
house in order from the U.S.-allied Arab country that has done the most to
fund Arab opposition movements during the Arab Spring uprisings of the past
year.
Seif's proposal is the first concerted attempt to merge opposition forces to
help end the conflict that has devastated large swathes of Syria, including
cities, and threatens to widen into a regional sectarian conflagration.
The initiative would also create a Supreme Military Council, a Judicial
Committee and a transitional government-in-waiting of technocrats - along
the lines of Libya's Transitional National Council, which managed to
galvanise international support for its successful battle to topple Gaddafi.
One SNC source said the grouping had only agreed to the Doha conference
under pressure from Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, the United States and
France.
Western states have been reluctant to offer overt support to anti-Assad
rebels inside the country too, fearing it would open the door to rule by
hardline Islamists among them.
"The Arab League will agree to whatever the Syrians agree, but there are
still differences over which political factions will dominate (in a new
body)," said Arab League Secretary-General Nabil al-Araby.
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Received on Thu Nov 08 2012 - 19:28:15 EST
