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The EU is
Supporting Terrorists in Syria
By President
al-Assad
February 08,
2017 "Information
Clearing House"
- "SANA"
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Damascus, President Bashar al-Assad stressed that Syria
is owned by the Syrians and that the peace is two
things: fighting terrorists and terrorism, stopping the
flowing of terrorism, every kind of logistical support.
Second, dialogue between the Syrians to decide the
future of their country and the whole political system.
On his
expectations from the new administration in Washington,
President Assad said, in a statement to Belgian
media,What we heard as statements by Trump during the
campaign and after the campaign is promising regarding
the priority of fighting terrorists, and mainly ISIS,
that’s what we’ve been asking for during the last six
years. So, I think this is promising, we have to wait,
it’s still early to expect anything practical. It could
be about the cooperation between the US and Russia, that
we think is going to be positive for the rest of the
world, including Syria. So, as I said, it’s still early
to judge it.
Question 1: Mr.
President, we’ve been to Aleppo, we’ve seen the
destruction, how do you see the way forward to peace
nowadays after Astana?
President Assad: If you
want to talk about how to see the peace, it’s not
related mainly to Astana; it’s related to something much
bigger: how can we stop the flowing of the terrorists
toward Syria, or in Syria, how can we stop the support
from regional countries like Turkey, Gulf states, or
from Europe like France and UK, or from the US during
the Obama administration. If we deal with that title,
this is where you can talk about the rest, about the
political procedure. Astana is one of the initiatives
during this war on Syria, and it’s about the dialogue
between the Syrians. Now it’s too early to judge Astana,
the first one was positive because it was about the
principles of the unity of Syria, about the Syrians
deciding their future. How can you implement this
communique? That’s the question, and I think we are
going to see Astana 2 and so on. So, the peace is two
things: fighting terrorists and terrorism, stopping the
flowing of terrorism, every kind of logistical support.
Second, dialogue between the Syrians to decide the
future of their country and the whole political system.
These are the headlines about how we see the future of
Syria.
Question 2: We have seen
many breaches in the ceasefire, would you consider the
ceasefire is still upholding, or is it dead?
President Assad: No, it’s
not dead, and it’s natural in every ceasefire anywhere
in the world, in every war, in any conflict, to have
these breaches. It could be sometimes on individual
levels, it doesn’t mean there’s policy of breaching the
ceasefire by the government or by any other party, and
this is something we can deal with on daily basis, and
sometimes on hourly basis, but till this moment, no, the
ceasefire is holding.
Question 3: In the fight
against terror group Daesh, do you think all means are
justified?
President Assad: Depends
on what do we mean by “all means,” you have to be…
Journalist: Literally all
means.
President Assad: Yeah,
but I don’t know what the means that are available to
tell you yes or “all means,” so I don’t what the “all
means” are. But if you want to talk about military
means, yes of course, because the terrorists are
attacking the people – I’m not only talking about ISIS;
ISIS and al-Nusra and all the Al Qaeda-affiliated groups
within Syria – when they are attacking civilians, and
killing civilians, and beheading people, and destroying
properties, private and public, and destroying the
infrastructure, everything in this country, let’s say,
our constitutional duty and legal duty as government and
as army and as state institutions is to defend the
Syrian people. It’s not an opinion; it’s a duty. So,
regarding this, you can use every mean in order to
defend the Syrian people.
Question 4: But we have
seen the destruction in Aleppo, you have seen the images
as well. Was there no other way to do it?
President Assad:
Actually, since the beginning of the crisis, of the war
on Syria, we used every possible way. We didn’t leave
any stone unturned in order to bring people to the
negotiating table, but when you talk about the
terrorists, when you talk about terrorists, when you
talk about Al Qaeda, when you talk about al-Nusra and
ISIS, I don’t think anyone in this world would believe
that they are ready for dialogue, and they always say
they’re not; they have their own ideology, they have
their own way path, they don’t accept anything that
could be related to civil state or civil country, they
don’t, and I think you know as a European about this
reality. So, no, making dialogue with al-Nusra and Al
Qaeda is not one of the means, but if somebody wanted to
change his course on the individual levels, we are ready
to accept him as a government, and give him amnesty when
he goes back to the normal life and gives up his
armament.
Question 5: The Belgian
government is contributing in the fight against Daesh.
There are six F-16 fighter planes in the fight against
Daesh. Are you grateful to the Belgian government for
that contribution?
President Assad: Let me
be frank with you, when you talk about contribution in
the operation against ISIS, actually there was no
operation against ISIS; it was a cosmetic operation, if
you want to talk about the American alliance against
ISIS. It was only an illusive alliance, because ISIS was
expanding during that operation. At the same time, that
operation is an illegal operation because it happened
without consulting with or taking the permission of the
Syrian government, which is the legitimate government,
and it’s a breaching of our sovereignty. Third, they
didn’t prevent any Syrian citizen from being killed by
ISIS, so what to be grateful for? To be frank, no.
Question 6: You have
stated several times that it is up to the Syrian people,
it is up to the constitution, to decide who their
leadership should be, who their president should be. If
the Syrian people would decide for a new leadership,
would you consider to step aside?
President Assad: If the
Syrian people choose another president, I don’t have to
choose to be aside; I would be aside, I would be outside
this position, that’s self-evident, because the
constitution will put the president, and the
constitution will take him out according to the ballot
box and the decision of the Syrian people. Of course,
that’s very natural, not only because of the ballot box;
because if you don’t have public support, you cannot
achieve anything in Syria, especially in a war. In a
war, what you need, the most important thing is to have
public support in order to restore your country, to
restore the stability and security. Without it, you
cannot achieve anything. So, yes, of course.
Question 7: Mr.
President, I am 43 years old, if I would have been born
in Syria, there would always have been an Assad in
executive power. Can you imagine a Syria without a
member of the Assad family in executive power?
President Assad: Of
course, we don’t own the country, my family doesn’t own
the country, to say that only Assad should be in that
position, that’s self-evident, and this could be by
coincidence, because President Assad didn’t have an heir
in the institution to be his successor. He died, I was
elected, he didn’t have anything to do with my election.
When he was president, I didn’t have any position in the
government. If he wanted me to be an heir, he would have
put me somewhere, gave me a responsibility, I didn’t
have any responsibility, actually. So, it’s not as many
in the media in the West used to say since my election,
that “he succeeded his father” or “his father put him in
that position.” So, yes, Syria is owned by the Syrians,
and every Syrian citizen has the right to be in that
position.
Question 8: Do you think
the European Union or even NATO can play a role in,
like, rebuilding the country, like, rebuilding Syria?
President Assad: You
cannot play that role while you are destroying Syria,
because the EU is supporting the terrorists in Syria
from the very beginning under different titles:
humanitarians, moderate, and so on. Actually, they were
supporting al-Nusra and ISIS from the very beginning,
they were extremists from the very beginning. So, they
cannot destroy and build at the same time. First of all,
they have to take a very clear position regarding the
sovereignty of Syria, stop supporting the terrorists.
This is where the Syrians would – I say would – accept
those countries to play a role in that regard. But in
the meantime, if you ask any Syrian the same question,
he will tell you “no, we don’t accept, those countries
supported the people who destroyed our country, we don’t
want them to be here.” That’s what I think.
Question 9: Do you think
Belgium can play a role in Syria?
President Assad: Let me
talk about the European political position in general;
many in this region believe that the Europeans don’t
exist politically, they only follow the master which is
the Americans. So, the question should be about the
Americans, and the Europeans will follow and will
implement what the Americans want. They don’t exist as
independent states, and Belgium is part of the EU.
Question 10: There is a
new administration in Washington, with Trump in power.
What do you expect from it? Are you looking to work
closely together?
President Assad: What we
heard as statements by Trump during the campaign and
after the campaign is promising regarding the priority
of fighting terrorists, and mainly ISIS, that’s what
we’ve been asking for during the last six years. So, I
think this is promising, we have to wait, it’s still
early to expect anything practical. It could be about
the cooperation between the US and Russia, that we think
is going to be positive for the rest of the world,
including Syria. So, as I said, it’s still early to
judge it.
Question 11: If you look
back on the last couple of years, are there any things
that you regret?
President Assad: Every
mistake could be a regret, by any individual, and as a
human…
Journalist: Have you made
mistakes?
President Assad: As a
human, I have to make mistakes to be human. Otherwise,
I’m not a human.
Journalist: What would
you consider a mistake?
President Assad: A
mistake is when you either take a wrong decision or make
a wrong practice, it depends on the situation. But if
you want to talk about the crisis, as I understand from
the question, the three decisions that we took from the
very beginning is to fight terrorism, and I think it’s
correct, is to make dialogue between the Syrians, I
think it’s correct, to respond to every political
initiative, whether it’s genuine or not, and I think
it’s correct, and actually we supported the
reconciliation between the Syrians, and I think it’s
correct. Anything else could be trivial, so you have a
lot of things regarding the practice, regarding the
institutions, you always have mistakes.
Question 12: If you look
back, was this war avoidable?
President Assad: No,
because there was bad intention regarding the different
countries like Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey, France, UK,
and the US in order to destabilize Syria, so it wasn’t
about the Syrians. That doesn’t mean that we don’t have
many flaws before the war and today as a country that
allow many of those countries to mess with our country.
I’m not excluding, I’m not saying it’s only about them,
but they were the one who took the initiative in order
to wage this war, so I don’t think it was avoidable.
Question 13: You have
just had a visit from a Belgian parliamentary delegation
with Mr. Dewinter and Mr. Carcaci, do you consider them
as friends?
President Assad: The most
important thing about those visits is not to be friends
with them. As a politician, you don’t come to Syria to
visit your friend; you come to Syria to see what’s going
on.
Journalist: Do you see
them as political allies?
President Assad: No,
they’re not my allies at all. They are coming here not
for that reason; they are here in order to see what’s
going on. They are the allies of the Belgian people.
They came here because the government, the Belgian
government, like many European governments, are blind
today, they have no relation with this country on every
level, so they don’t see what’s going on, they cannot
play any role. So, now the only eyes that you have are
the delegations that are coming from your country, and
this is one of them, this is one of the eyes that your
government could have, and you could have many other
eyes and delegations coming to Syria. So, they’re not my
allies, they’re not coming here for me; they’re coming
here to see the situation, and I’m one of the players in
the Syrian conflict, it’s natural to meet with me to
hear what’s my point of view.
Question 14: Mr.
President, just one more question: after the victories
in Aleppo, Wadi Barada, your troops are close from al-Bab,
do you think that all these major victories can change
the mind of European governments concerning the Syrian
government?
President Assad: I don’t
know, I think they have to answer that question. For us,
it’s our war, we need to liberate every single inch on
the Syrian territory from those terrorists. If the
European governments think that their efforts went in
vain, that’s good, they may change their mind, and at
least to stop supporting those terrorists that don’t
have the support of the public in Syria; they only have
the support of the Europeans and the Gulf states, the
Wahabi Gulf states, in order to have more terrorism and
extremism in Syria. We hope, I think during the last two
years, the whole world has changed, the United States
has changed, the situation in Syria has changed, the
situation in the region in general has changed. Two
things didn’t change or hasn’t changed till this moment:
first of all, Al Qaeda is still there through ISIS and
al-Nusra, and the mentality of the European officials,
it hasn’t change yet, they live in the past.
Question 15: Mr.
President, in your opinion, what is our ______ to
question if after the war, the international court in
the Hague should go over some responsibles on the crimes
against humanity against the Syrian people, do you
support that view, that the responsibles of the crimes
at war should be judged by the international court in
the Hague?
President Assad: We all
know that the United Nations institutions are not
unbiased, they are biased, because of the American
influence and the French and British, mainly. So, most
of those institutions, they don’t work to bring the
stability to the world or to look for the truth; they
are only politicized to implement the agenda of those
countries. For me, as president, when I do my duty, the
same for the government and for the army, to defend our
country, we don’t look to this issue, we don’t care
about it. We have to defend our country by every mean,
and when we have to defend it by every mean, we don’t
care about this court, or any other international
institution.
Question 16: Yes. Do you
accept the position of the United Nations?
President Assad: It
depends on that position. Most of the positions are
biased, as I said, regarding every organization,
regarding every sector, regarding most of the
resolutions against Syria. That’s why it was for the
first time maybe for Russia and China to take so many
vetoes in few years, because they know this reality. So,
no, we don’t accept, we don’t accept.
The views
expressed in this article are solely those of the author
and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of
Information Clearing House. |
