League must take sterner stance Thursday, 10 November 2011 05:40

Qatar has sought another emergency meeting of the Arab League on Saturday to take stock of the continuing crisis in Syria in the face  of President Bashar Assad government’s disdainful disregard of the peace plan it had agreed to just weeks ago.

The Syrian National Council sent a letter to the League on Tuesday urging it “to take a strong and effective position against the Syrian regime commensurate with the dangerous development of the situation in Syria.”

As I mentioned in my previous column, there had been several indicators that the Syria peace plan forged by the Arab League at its meeting in Doha last month were headed for failure.

First the plan was not off to a good start with Syria initially refusing to conduct talks in Doha or anywhere outside Syria.  Another was that the Syrian delegation that came to Qatar for the talks left the country without giving its response to the League’s proposal. It was only a few days later that Damascus finally agreed to the peace plan proposed by the Arab League.

Finally, the Syrian regime is in no mood to relinquish power which can be seen in the way they have kept announcing that reforms are in the offing without any sign of it on the grounds.

Assad has not mentioned even once that he would leave the Presidential palace like Tunisia’s Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak and more recently, Yemen’s Ali Abdullah Saleh did when they promised to give up their position as the protests in their countries intensified. That simply means that the Assad regime is still eager to continue holding on to power.

According to Ravina Shamdasani, a spokeswoman for the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights “more than 60 people are reported to have been killed by Syrian security forces since Syria signed the (Arab League) peace plan”. However, the UN adds that this estimate is conservative. This brings the total number of people killed since the Syrian protests started in March to 3,500.

The Arab League must take responsibility for those who died during this period and even those who were killed before the peace plan was signed because it failed to take effective action against Assad’s regime.

What will come out of this coming Saturday’s meeting is anybody’s guess but we hope that the League will not provide yet another chance to the regime to buy time because that will mean more deaths in Syria.

It is not only the Syrians, but the entire Arab nation is asking the Arab League to take a tougher stance against the Syrian government. First, they should suspend Syria’s membership of the Arab League like what it did in the case of Libya when Gaddafi launched a violent crackdown on protesters.

Second, the League should recognise the Syrian National Council as the true representative of the Syrian people as well as impose a “no-fly zone” similar to what they did to Gaddafi’s regime in Libya.

Third, they should put pressure on the international community to take immediate action and compel them to enforce economic sanctions against Syria in order to weaken the support that Syrian businessmen in Damascus and Aleppo have given to Assad’s regime. It is particularly fitting to impose sanctions on fuel and oil supplies especially since winter is coming. These economic restrictions will force businessmen rethink their loyalty to the regime and convince them to support the Syrian protests.

Fourth, with the regime increasing the suppression of human rights as seen through the high number of people killed and tortured by the government, the Arab League should bring Syria’s case to the International Criminal Court for violation of human rights.

Finally, the Arab League especially the GCC countries, should try to influence Russia and China not to support Assad’s regime since the benefit in supporting the Syrian people will far outweigh those of siding with the regime.

The Arab League should also not be worried about Iran’s support for Syria because as we have seen in recent reports that Iran’s tone is changing and it is even advising Assad to implement reforms in the country.

Also, Iran has problems of its own especially with recent reports from the International Atomic Energy Agency that it is developing a nuclear bomb and Israel suggesting a pre-emptive attack against it. Iran is also more concerned about Iraq since the deadline for US troops withdrawal is looming.

With all these developments happening now, Iran will not get involved in Syria, except perhaps to give advise to Assad since it is busy dealing with its own problems.

The Arab League therefore should take a stronger action against Assad’s regime. They have already given Assad the chance to make reforms in his country. However, with the almost daily killings of Syrian people, including innocent children, even during Eid Al Adha, it seems that the regime is not serious in implementing reforms and its promises are only written on paper.

Assad’s regime should learn from the mistakes of Gaddafi in Libya. Gaddafi’s death should be the beginning of Assad’s new life so that he will not take the same risks and errors as Gaddafi did.

As a member and current Chair of the Arab League and one of the leaders in the committee to resolve the Syrian crisis, Qatar should take the initiative and do more for alleviating the sufferings of the Syrian people.

After all, the essence of Arab nationalism is to unify the Arab world through helping the Arab people, especially in times of conflict and trouble.

The Peninsula