Crisis in Syri� #31: From counting victims to counting massacres

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Op zaterdag 3 augustus 2013 17:42 schreef Charismatisch het volgende:

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Niet alleen de oogarts steunde al-Qaeda. Maar Iran steunt ook bepaalde al-Qaeda groeperingen en leden (en de Taliban in Afghanistan):

The situation in Yemen shows that the Saudi-Iranian rivalry is not strictly sectarian. Indeed, Iran has demonstrated a capacity to reach across religious divides to work with Sunni groups that share an anti-Saudi or anti-US agenda. According to Saudi claims, Iran is providing covert financial support to the Sunni-Wahhabi group Ansar Al-Sharia, an al-Qaeda affiliated militant group in Yemen. This is occurring despite the divergent ideological agendas of the Iranian regime and the Sunni group. Tehran’s aim has been to encourage Ansar Al-Sharia to kidnap more Saudi diplomats to force the monarchy to comply with their demands. Likewise, Iran has provided support to the Taliban in Afghanistan. It has additionally provided sanctuary to al-Qaeda’s most senior leaders, such as Yasin al-Suri, Saif al-Adel and Abu Muhammad al-Masri. Not surprisingly, Iran’s connections with the salafi-jihadist movement have evolved as the once cooperative relations between al-Qaeda and Saudi Arabia have become increasingly hostile.

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Op zaterdag 3 augustus 2013 18:49 schreef Schurkenstaat het volgende:

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Leuke poging, maar stuk voor stuk geen sterke argumenten. Dat komt omdat HRW e.d. de zgn. vrijheidsstrijders juridisch gezien meestal als burgers kwalificeren. En niet heel onterecht, omdat dit geen geuniformeerde strijders zijn en dus ook lastig te identificeren zijn.

Nogal logisch dat Assad via die redenering het vooral op zgn. burgers gemunt heeft.

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Op zaterdag 3 augustus 2013 21:51 schreef Peunage het volgende:
Iran heeft samen met de VS tegen de Taliban gevochten in Afghanistan.

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Op zaterdag 3 augustus 2013 22:12 schreef Charismatisch het volgende:

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Klopt. Als dank voor hun services werden ze door Bush als As van het Kwaad bestempeld. Daarna ging Iran toch maar weer steun verlenen aan de anti-Amerikaanse milities in Afghanistan en Irak.

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Assad’s no enemy of al-Qaeda


Last week, General Salim Idris, the head of the Supreme Military Command, made this point for the first time in a little-noticed interview he gave to al-Arabiya, about a fortnight or so after one of his deputy commanders was shot in the chest by the coastal emir of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, the Iraqi-based al-Qaeda syndicate now highly active in Syria. In the course of explaining how these “foreigners” were generally fucking up the noble rebel cause, Idris let slip this comment: “We refuse them strongly because unfortunately they work with the regime of the criminal Bashar al-Assad.” A cynic would pause only momentarily before concluding that this was little more than a shrewd propaganda trick for Idris to perform, desperate as he is for long-promised and long-deferred U.S. weapons. After all, there is a budding crisis between the moderate Free Syrian Army forces under his command and al-Qaeda. What better way to convince Washington that you’re the kosher sort of rebel than by signposting as both a happy antagonist of the latter as well as the regime?

According to those close to Idris, this interview deviated from his usual talking points in the press, where he’s been careful to distance himself from jihadists, but hasn't repudiate them outright since Supreme Military Command units partner militarily with the Islamic State and the other, older al-Qaeda iteration in Syria with which it has lately merged, Jabhat al-Nusra. Few were expecting Idris to effectively denounce the Bin Ladenists as collaborators with Damascus, which in revolutionary terms is about as bad as declaring all-out war against them, which no one this senior in the FSA has yet done.

At the most literal level, Idris is correct. The Guardian in May quoted a Western official who said that the regime is indeed cooperating with Jabhat al-Nusra, the other al-Qaeda syndicate in Syria, which technically merged with the Islamic State after pledging allegiance to Ayman al-Zawahiri, because al-Nusra controls the oil fields in Deir Ezzor. According to a Muslim Brotherhood-linked rebel fighter, the regime “pay[s] more than 150m Syrian lire [�1.4m] monthly to Jabhat al-Nusra to guarantee oil is kept pumping through two major oil pipelines in Banias and Latakia. Middlemen trusted by both sides are to facilitate the deal and transfer money to the organisation.”

Occluded in the carefully scripted and produced reinvention of the regime as a mortal enemy of al-Qaeda is the fact that it was once the chief facilitator and egger-on of al-Qaeda and may in fact retain vestiges of this old relationship even unto the present day. Every Syrian revolutionary I’ve ever met or spoken with believes that, at some level, the Machiavellian who used to send “ratlines” of al-Qaeda fighters into Iraq and provide newly arrived jihadist recruits with safe houses in the Jazira, is still working with these erstwhile allies, even at the cost of seeing his own military and security installations blown up in suicide or car bombings. The purpose is to advance a perception that has in fact gained considerable traction in the international press in the last year or so; namely, that Assad is enjoined in the global war on terror and that his enemies are American and Western enemies who should not be aided or armed in any way. (The FSB, Russia’s successor agency to the KGB, has been credibly accused of staging false flag terrorist bombings in and outside of Moscow in 2000 order to rally domestic and international opinion for the Second Chechen War. Because Syria’s intelligence and military elite have all been trained in the former Soviet Union or in post-Soviet Russia, I’d wager that Moscow has been more than a curious bystander in helping Assad realize the propaganda value to be mined from such a perception.)

This would probably be easily dismissed as a conspiracy theory but for the fact that former regime officials have said much the same thing. So have al-Nusra defectors, one of whom told a colleague of mine in Idlib recently that it was absolutely the case that the mukhabarat continues to maintain close ties with the organization now blacklisted by the United States.

To date, the most prominent regime defector to make this allegation was Nawaf al-Fares, the former Syrian ambassador to Iraq, who turned against his embassy and his government in June 2012. Al-Fares is the chief of the Oqaydat tribe, a major clan in Deir Ezzor, and is thus familiar with the terrain that abuts Anbar Province and was used as the gateway for 90 percent of the foreign fighters joining al-Qaeda in Iraq during the height of that country’s civil war. He told The Sunday Telegraph a year ago that that jihadi units he himself helped send into Iraq were immolating themselves in Syria, at the behest of the regime. One such spectacular, Fares said, was against the military intelligence complex in al-Qazzaz, Damascus in May 2012 (just a month prior to his defection) in which 55 people were killed, and 370 wounded. “I know for certain that not a single serving intelligence official was harmed during that explosion, as the whole office had been evacuated 15 minutes beforehand,” he said. “All the victims were passersby instead. All these major explosions have been perpetrated by al-Qaeda through cooperation with the security forces.”

Of particular interest in al-Fares’ exposure of this alliance was his mention of a U.S. Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) raid in October 2008 into the village of al-Sukariya near the border town Abu Kamal to kill Abu Ghadiya, or Badran Turki al-Mazidih, a smuggler in his late twenties who helped funnel explosives and personnel into Anbar Province. At the peak of his success, Abu Ghadiya was moving 100 or so fighters per month, all with the complete knowledge and likely consent of Assef Shawkat, Assad’s now-assassinated brother-in-law. Fares told CNN that the camp hit by the JSOC team in an operation remarkably similar to the one that would later kill Bin Laden in Abbottabad was not only under the control of Shawkat, but that Shawkat actually visited the scene an hour after Abu Ghadiya’s death. (When then-British Foreign Secretary David Miliband confronted Assad personally in Damascus about Abu Ghadiya’s presence in Syria under obvious mukhabarat patronage, the dictator not only lied and said the man was never there, but then, as is his logical wont, angrily claim that Abu Ghadiya’s snuffing by the Americans was a violation of Syria’s sovereignty.)

The details of this raid, as recounted by Fares, were not only confirmed by an unnamed Obama administration official cited by CNN at the time but then later substantiated and expanded upon in an essay for Foreign Policy published several months later – in October 2012 – and written Michael R. Gordon and Wesley S. Morgan, based on an excerpt from Gordon and General Bernard E. Trainor’s book, The Endgame: The Inside Story of the Struggle for Iraq, from George W. Bush to Barack Obama. (In a further sign of al-Fares’ credibility, he also told the BBC shortly after his defection that not only would Assad use chemical weapons if he felt severely threatened by the opposition but he’d likely already done so.)

This accusation of complicity with al-Qaeda was corroborated recently by another regime defector in an interview scarcely noticed by the Western press. Affaq Ahmad, the former right-hand man of General Jamil Hasan, the head of Syria’s Air Force intelligence and one of Assad’s most brutal and trusted henchman, defected after the regime’s kidnapping and murder of Hamza al-Khatib in 2011. He first went to Jordan and now is based somewhere in France. He said that the mukhabarat has thoroughly infiltrated jihadist and non-jihadist rebel groups in Syria at the command level and – even more significant – that it controls several brigades that have simply stopped fighting regime forces altogether. Ahmad’s comments are worth quoting at length:

The infiltration usually is focused on the sponsors, the grand Sheikh, or the top leaders of the groups, and mainly via manipulating the sources of financial support.

Currently, there are more than 25 brigades in the Free Syrian Army [Ahmad appears to use this term to encompass both jihadists and non-jihadists –ed] in Aleppo, and Hama that do not get close to the regime forces, nor get in fights with them. They also decline to get into fights in the coastal areas due to an agreement between them and the regime that had been brokered by the financial backers of these brigades.

Actually, the jihadist groups and brigades were very useful for the regime because they provided a justification for the regime’s insistence on a military solution, and provided some legitimacy under the cover of the War on Terror.

These groups did not cross the red lines that were agreed on by the regime and their sponsors. This included the regime accepting the killing by those groups of Alawis and Druze in order to use that to convince these minorities to rally around the regime and hold on to it.

Which is certainly barbaric enough a plan for Assad to take up. The Palestine Branch of Syrian military intelligence and the Special Operations Division of Air Force intelligence, headed by Colonel Suhail Hassan, are the mukhabarat bureaus in charge of overseeing the infiltration effort, Ahmad explained.

Elizabeth O’Bagy of the Syrian Emergency Task Force relayed the following anecdote to me. A few FSA commanders recently went to one of the tribal authorities (not on anyone’s side in the revolution but its own) and complained about al-Nusra’s parlays with the regime and tribes of Deir Ezzor designed to divvy up the profits from the Syrian oil sector. The tribal authority confirmed everything but told the FSA commanders not to raise a fuss because “we’re making a lot money on oil sales.” O’Bagy also said that al-Nusra and the Islamic State is rumored to have cut a deal with the regime not to participate on front-lines of battles and reduce spectacular attacks in exchange for being allowed to govern their own territories in the north.

“That is what happened in Raqqa,” O’Bagy said. “It was a negotiated solution.”

What this means is that al-Qaeda’s rampage through Syria, now the latest obsession of counterterrorism and Pentagon officials, is not really a simply case of “blowback”; it’s more like a controlled demolition by an extremely savvy contractor. This should also complicate one of the more brittle cliches you continue to hear Washington, which is that we don’t really know who’s who in the opposition. That may be true, but the more important question is: do we even remember who’s who in the regime?

SPOILER

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Op zaterdag 3 augustus 2013 22:11 schreef Frikandelbroodje het volgende:

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Amnesty, HRW, journalisten en de VN die rebellen voornamelijk als burgers beschouwen? Ik weet dat Amnesty etc weleens de waarheid kunnen verdraaien, maar dat het zo ver zou gaan is nieuw voor me. Volgens het oorlogsrecht is het ook zo dat je niet meer als burger kunt worden beschouwd wanneer je de wapens oppakt. Dus ik zou daar graag een bron voor zien.

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Op zondag 4 augustus 2013 00:10 schreef mr_jack het volgende:
Abu Sakar. rot in hell

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Syri� verbiedt gebruik buitenlands geld

Iedere Syrische handelaar die zijn waar verkoopt tegen buitenlandse valuta kan voortaan tot 10 jaar gevangenisstraf krijgen. Dat staat in een nieuw decreet dat de Syrische president Bashar al-Assad zondag heeft uitgevaardigd. .

Het decreet verbiedt het gebruik van iedere andere munteenheid dan de Syrische pond. Die munt staat ernstig onder druk sinds de burgeroorlog, die sinds 2011 het land in zijn greep heeft.

Het besluit versterkt reeds bestaande verboden op het handelen in buitenlandse munteenheden. Handelaren verwachten echter niet dat deze ingreep zal voorkomen dat men zijn toevlucht zoekt tot de stabielere Amerikaanse dollar.

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Op zondag 4 augustus 2013 09:55 schreef Schurkenstaat het volgende:

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Ze verdraaien de waarheid niet. Het zijn geen offici�le strijdkrachten (de organisatie kan ongetwijfeld niet goed worden aangetoond, want men draagt geen universele kleding en/of kenmerken). De gesneuvelden hebben zodoende de militaire en juridische status van "burgers".

Het verdraait echter wel het beeld van het conflict.

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Op maandag 5 augustus 2013 00:30 schreef Charismatisch het volgende:
Interessant artikel dit, geeft een totaal ander beeld van het conflict. Wat doet Bandar "Bush" in Moskou?

The Syrian Problem: Saudi Prince Bandar and Putin meet in Moscow
http://www.syrianews.cc/syrian-problem-saudi-bandar-putin/

twitter:

Charles_Lister twitterde op maandag 05-08-2013 om 23:44:48 The Syrian Coalition has issued a statement confirming and congratulating rebels for seizing Minagh airbase this evening. #Syria #Aleppo reageer retweet

twitter:

Charles_Lister twitterde op maandag 05-08-2013 om 23:44:48 The Syrian Coalition has issued a statement confirming and congratulating rebels for seizing Minagh airbase this evening. #Syria #Aleppo reageer retweet

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'Assad heeft nieuwe gifgasaanval gepleegd'

Legertroepen van de Syrische machthebber Bashar al-Assad zouden opnieuw chemische wapens hebben ingezet tegen de opstandelingen.

Volgens een Syrische mensenrechtenorganisatie in Londen heeft het leger dit weekend gifgas gebruikt toen het probeerde posities van de rebellen in te nemen ten noordoosten van de hoofdstad Damascus.

Tientallen inwoners van de plaats Adra moesten worden behandeld tegen misselijkheid en ademnood. Ook zeker 30 strijders kampten met klachten.

Het regime en de rebellen beschuldigen elkaar geregeld van het gebruik van gifgas in de ruim 2 jaar durende burgeroorlog. Een team van de Verenigde Naties zal ''zo snel mogelijk'' naar het land reizen om de zaak te onderzoeken.

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Rebellen Syri� rukken op in gebied Alawieten
Syrische rebellengroepen zijn een offensief begonnen in het gebied waar de familie Assad vandaan komt.

Oppositiegroepen stellen dat strijders oprukken in de richting van Latakia, de belangrijkste havenstad van het land.
De aanval heeft los van dat strategische doel ook symbolische betekenis. Rebellen naderden maandag de plaats Qardaha. Dat is het geboortedorp van Hafiz al-Assad, de vorige president en vader van huidig heerser Bashar al-Assad. In het gebied in het westen van het land wonen veel Alawieten, de religieuze minderheid waar de Assads toe behoren.
Volgens een woordvoerder van een tv-zender van de oppositie hebben de rebellen voordeel van het bergachtige landschap. ''In dit ruige terrein hebben tanks weinig nut voor het regime.'' Op videobeelden, waarvan de oorsprong overigens niet gecontroleerd kan worden, was te zien dat rebellen anti-tankwapens afvuren en later bidden naast een verlaten tank.
Al-Qaeda
Onder de aanvallers zouden twee aan de terroristische organisatie al-Qaeda verbonden groepen zijn. Onder hun leden zijn onder meer zelfmoordcommando's. Die zouden ook een rol hebben gespeeld bij een andere overwinning die de Syrische rebellen maandagavond meldden. Ze claimden de verovering van een militair vliegveld in de buurt van de grens met Turkije. De basis was acht maanden lang belegerd.

nu.nl

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A gruesome video has emerged on the Internet, showing foreign-backed militants in Syria setting three Syrian Kurds on fire.

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Op dinsdag 6 augustus 2013 16:03 schreef expans het volgende:
Is een oud filmpje uit Irak.

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Volgens een Syrische mensenrechtenorganisatie in Londen

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'Assad heeft nieuwe gifgasaanval gepleegd'

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Rebellen Syri� rukken op in gebied Alawieten

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Op dinsdag 6 augustus 2013 19:37 schreef Kesefkesef het volgende:
Ondanks het feit dat Isra�l en Syri� in oorlog zijn behandelen diverse Isra�lische ziekenhuizen toch Syrische gewonden. Veelal mannen in de leeftijd tussen de 20 en 30 die gewond raken in de strijd, maar steeds vaker worden ook kinderen en vrouwen binnengebracht.

Dat schrijft de New York Times.

Omdat beide landen in oorlog met elkaar zijn, blijven de grenzen gesloten voor vluchtelingen. Toch wordt de medische zorg door de autoriteiten gehonoreerd. In totaal zijn sinds maart zeker 100 Syri�rs behandeld in ziekenhuizen in Noord-Isra�l. De kosten zijn voor de Isra�lische staat.

Onder de gewonden is op dit moment een 13-jarig meisje die al ruim een maand in het ziekenhuis verblijft. Samen met haar 9-jarige broertje ging ze naar de supermarkt in haar dorp waar ze getroffen werden door een granaat. Haar broertje kwam om het leven, het meisje is overgebracht naar een Isra�lisch ziekenhuis waar ze intensieve operaties onderging aan onder meer haar gezicht en armen.

De familie wist lange tijd niet waar het meisje was. Nu is haar tante bij haar in het ziekenhuis en mag ze binnenkort terug naar haar geboorteland. Haar tante: “Ik zeg niet dat we in Isra�l zijn geweest, ik ben bang voor de reacties”.
http://www.refdag.nl/nieu(...)he_gewonden_1_759572

http://www.nytimes.com/20(...)s-wounded.html?_r=1&

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Op dinsdag 6 augustus 2013 19:43 schreef Peunage het volgende:

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Ze behandelen niet alleen gewonde 13 jarige meisjes. Ze begonnen met gewonde FSA strijders.

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Syri� spreekt bevroren tegoeden aan om voedselcrisis aan te pakken

Syri� spreekt zijn bevroren tegoeden aan om de uitgeputte voedselvoorraden aan te vullen. Brussel en Washington stemmen daar, met het oog op de ernst van de humanitaire crisis, mee in. Dat meldt persbureau Reuters.

Door de burgeroorlog, die al meer dan twee jaar voortduurt, heerst er een ernstig voedseltekort in Syri�. Het land ervaart de belabberdste graanoogst in drie decennia en de economie lijdt onder de bevroren tegoeden. President Bashar al-Assad heeft nu echter een manier gevonden om die tegoeden aan de spreken, namelijk door ze in te zetten om de grootschalige voedselcrisis in zijn land aan te pakken.

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Op dinsdag 6 augustus 2013 17:35 schreef Djibril het volgende:

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uhm, nee

Ik snap dat het als Turk moeilijk is om te zien dat Koerden steeds meer macht krijgen in Syrie maar je kan de feiten niet blijven ontkennen.
Paar posts terug zei je al dat het vooral propaganda is van de Koerden maar nu krijg je beelden en nog ga je het ontkennen.

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Oppositie: tientallen rebellen Syri� gedood

Tientallen opstandelingen zijn woensdagochtend vroeg omgekomen toen zij in de buurt van de stad Adra, ten oosten van de Syrische hoofdstad Damascus, in een hinderlaag van het leger liepen. Dat heeft het Syrisch Observatorium voor de Mensenrechten, dat de oppositie in Syri� steunt, vanuit de Libanese hoofdstad Beiroet laten weten.

Er zouden 62 opstandelingen zijn omgekomen. Het staatspersbureau SANA bevestigde dat er een aanval is geweest, maar noemde geen dodental. Alle opstandelingen zouden zijn gedood.
De opstandelingen zouden hebben behoord tot al-Nusra, een beweging die banden heeft met het terreurnetwerk al-Qaeda

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(Reuters) - Saudi Arabia has offered Russia economic incentives including a major arms deal and a pledge not to challenge Russian gas sales if Moscow scales back support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Middle East sources and Western diplomats said on Wednesday.

The proposed deal between two of the leading power brokers in Syria's devastating civil war was set out by Saudi intelligence chief Prince Bandar bin Sultan at a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow last week, they said.

Russia has supported Assad with arms and diplomatic cover throughout the war and any change in Moscow's stance would remove a major obstacle to action on Syria by the United Nations Security Council.

Syrian opposition sources close to Saudi Arabia said Prince Bandar offered to buy up to $15 billion of Russian weapons as well as ensuring that Gulf gas would not threaten Russia's position as a main gas supplier to Europe.

In return, Saudi Arabia wanted Moscow to ease its strong support of Assad and agree not to block any future Security Council Resolution on Syria, they said.

A Gulf source familiar with the matter confirmed that Prince Bandar offered to buy large quantities of arms from Russia, but that no cash amount was specified in the talks.

One Lebanese politician close to Saudi Arabia said the meeting between Bandar and Putin lasted four hours. "The Saudis were elated about the outcome of the meeting," said the source, without elaborating.

Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, could not immediately be reached on Wednesday for comment about the meeting. A Saudi Foreign Ministry official was also not immediately available to respond.

Putin's initial response to Bandar's offer was inconclusive, diplomats say. One Western diplomat in the Middle East said the Russian leader was unlikely to trade Moscow's recent high profile in the region for an arms deal, however substantial.

He said Russian officials also appeared skeptical that Saudi Arabia had a clear plan for stability in Syria if Assad fell.

CHEMICAL WEAPONS

However, in a possible sign of greater flexibility by Moscow, other diplomats said that in the run-up to the meeting Russia put pressure on Assad to allow in a U.N. mission to investigate the suspected use of chemical weapons.

The U.N. team is expected to visit Syria next week.

"This was one of those unannounced meetings that could prove much more important than the public diplomatic efforts being made on Syria," one diplomat said.

A senior Syrian opposition figure said there had been a "build-up of Russian-Saudi contacts prior to the meeting".

"Bandar sought to allay two main Russian fears: that Islamist extremists will replace Assad, and that Syria would become a conduit for Gulf, mainly Qatari, gas at the expense of Russia," he said. "Bandar offered to intensify energy, military and economic cooperation with Moscow."

Saudi Arabia and other Sunni Muslim powers have been strong supporters of the mainly Sunni rebels battling Assad, from Syria's minority Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam. The rebels have been joined by foreign Sunni jihadis.

Assad has enjoyed military support from Iran and fighters from Hezbollah and Iraqi Shi'ites.

Russia has maintained military sales to Syria throughout the two year conflict in which 100,000 people have been killed, and helped block three U.N. draft resolutions criticizing Assad's crackdown on the mainly peaceful protests against him in 2011.

The Security Council has been considering a possible resolution on aid for Syria for several months and a shift in position by Moscow could alleviate this.

Ruslan Pukhov, director of the Moscow-based defense think tank CAST, said he had no direct knowledge of the offer, but he would not be surprised if a contract to supply Saudi Arabia with 150 Russian T-90 tanks were revived.

"There was an order of T-90s that was stopped for mysterious reasons, and if this is a resurrection of that order then we could suspect that the Saudis want something in return and that something could be linked to Syria," said Pukhov, who is close to Russia's Defense Ministry.

"If the Saudis want Moscow to outright drop Assad, they will refuse the deal, but they may have a more nuanced position, which they could possibly agree to."

Russia and Saudi Arabia penned an arms contract in 2008 for 150 T-90s as well as more than 100 Mi-17 and Mi-35 attack helicopters as well as BMP-3 infantry fighting vehicles, but the contract has stalled for years.

Russian newspaper Kommersant reported at the time that the contract was concluded to persuade Moscow to curtail its ties with Iran, though the Kremlin denied that report.

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BEIRUT — Moscow has rejected a Saudi proposal to abandon Syria's president in return for a huge arms deal and a pledge to boost Russian influence in the Arab world, diplomats told AFP.
On July 31, President Vladimir Putin, a strong backer of Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad, met Saudi Arabia's influential intelligence chief Prince Bandar bin Sultan, after which both Moscow and Riyadh kept a lid on the substance of the talks.
"Every two years, Bandar bin Sultan meets his Russian counterparts, but this time, he wanted to meet the head of state," said a European diplomat who shuttles between Beirut and Damascus.
"During the meeting at the Kremlin, the Saudi official explained to his interlocutor that Riyadh is ready to help Moscow play a bigger role in the Middle East at a time when the United States is disengaging from the region."
Bandar proposed that Saudi Arabia buy $15 billion (11 billion euros) of weapons from Russia and invest "considerably in the country," the source said.
The Saudi prince also reassured Putin that "whatever regime comes after" Assad, it will be "completely" in the Saudis' hands and will not sign any agreement allowing any Gulf country to transport its gas across Syria to Europe and compete with Russian gas exports, the diplomat said.
In 2009, Assad refused to sign an agreement with Qatar for an overland pipeline running from the Gulf to Europe via Syria to protect the interests of its Russian ally, which is Europe's top supplied of natural gas.
An Arab diplomat with contacts in Moscow said: "President Putin listened politely to his interlocutor and let him know that his country would not change its strategy."
"Bandar bin Sultan then let the Russians know that the only option left in Syria was military and that they should forget about Geneva because the opposition would not attend."
Russia and the United States have been trying for months to organise an international peace conference between Assad's regime and the opposition to take place in Geneva, but so far to no avail.
Asked about the Putin-Bandar meeting, a Syrian politician said: "As was the case before with Qatar and Lavrov (in talks), Saudi Arabia thinks that politics is a simple matter of buying people or countries. It doesn't understand that Russia is a major power and that this is not how it draws up policy."
"Syria and Russia have had close ties for over half a century in all fields and it's not Saudi rials that will change this fact," he added.
The meeting between Bandar and Putin came amid tension between Moscow and Riyadh over the conflict in Syria, as Russia has accused the Saudis of "financing and arming terrorists and extremist groups" in the war which has killed more than 100,000 people since March 2011.
While there was no official reaction to the meeting, Russian experts also said Putin had apparently turned down the Saudi offer.
According to military expert Alexander Goltz from online opposition newspaper Ejednevny, "such an agreement seems extremely improbable."
"Support for Assad is a matter of principle for Vladimir Putin," he said. "Even the bait of $15 billion, a huge sum that represents two years' turnover for Rosoboronexport (Russia's arms exporting agency), will have no effect."
Independent security expert Andrei Soldatov, who runs the Agentura.ru website said: "This disinformation is aimed more at destabilising Assad and his entourage.
"Assad's position is growing stronger and stronger, and the Kremlin knows this. Turning against them in this situation would be very stupid ... And don't forget that in general the Saudis take years to keep their promises."

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Op donderdag 8 augustus 2013 19:14 schreef IPA35 het volgende:

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http://www.france24.com/e(...)drop-assad-arms-deal



Hebben de Saoedi�rs niks beter te doen? Het het stenigen van autorijdende vrouwen of zo...

Overigens hoeven we ons heen zorgen te maken over een offensief in Latakia hoor. De meeste van die paar dorpjes zijn inmiddels heroverd en de strijders die daarbij zijn gedood waren hoofdzakelijk buitenlanders.

Het was dan ook gewoon achterlijk om juist daar een offensief te starten zeker nu zij hun manschappen hard nodig hebben in Homs en Idlib. Dan daarbij zijn Salafisten niet bepaald welkom in Latakia.

http://sana.sy/eng/337/2013/08/08/496361.htm

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Op vrijdag 9 augustus 2013 00:57 schreef rakotto het volgende:

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Alsof Syrie nu niet in de handen is van Rusland en Iran. Onder Assad of na Assad (mits in handen van andere landen) is niet echt iets om trots op te zijn.

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Op vrijdag 9 augustus 2013 18:45 schreef expans het volgende:
Goddamn, reallife cod dit.

جبهة فتح العاصمة ضرب رتل دبابات على جبهة كرجات العباسيين 6/8/2013

جبهة فتح العاصمة : مميز جدا استهداف دبابة من قبل المجاهدين 7/8/2013

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[....zie bron...]Het oostelijke deel van de stad is grotendeels in handen van gewapende milities, terwijl het Syrische leger het westelijke deel van Aleppo controleert. Daar bevinden zich de meeste christelijke wijken. Die zijn overbevolkt vanwege een vluchtelingenstroom. De inwoners van dit deel van de stad dreigen van de honger om te komen.

De gewapende Syrische oppositie is een blokkade begonnen. Aleppo is omsingeld en voedsel kan de stad niet meer bereiken. Met als gevolg dat fruit, groente en vlees niet langer voorradig zijn en de enkele producten die nog te verkrijgen zijn, worden verkocht tegen astronomische prijzen. Binnen enkele dagen dreigt er ook geen brood meer beschikbaar te zijn, omdat er bijna geen tarwe meer voorhanden is.
Geen maaltijden

De gevolgen zijn dramatisch. De christelijke liefdadigheids�organisatie al-Ihsan moest haar werk stoppen. Zij verstrekte dagelijks maaltijden aan 35.000 mensen. Een soortgelijke door de jezu�eten geleide organisatie staat op het punt haar maaltijdvoorziening aan armen en vluchtelingen te staken. De arts uit Aleppo schrijft dat vrijwel alle inwoners van de stad tussen de 8 en de 18 kilo aan gewicht hebben verloren.

Inwoners van Aleppo wachten wanhopig op protesten van Europa en de Verenigde Staten. Zij hopen dat ge�ist wordt dat de blokkade wordt opgeheven. Een bevolking van 2,5 miljoen zielen wordt uitgehongerd, maar in het westen blijft het oorverdovend stil. Er dreigt in Aleppo een humanitaire crisis van ongekende omvang en de plaatselijke kerken staan totaal machteloos, schrijft de arts.[...zie bron]

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Air strikes by the Syrian military killed at least 20 people in the northwestern province of Latakia overnight, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights group said on Saturday.

"The toll in several air strikes on the town of Salma in Jabal Akrad rose to at least 20 people," Observatory director Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP.

Abdel Rahman said 10 of those killed were believed to be civilians, although many of the bodies were so badly disfigured that it was not immediately possible to identify them.

At least six of those killed were Syrian rebel fighters, while four were foreign volunteers, he added.

"The number of deaths is expected to rise because of the number of wounded and those in serious condition among them," he said.

Latakia province is a stronghold of the Alawite minority of President Bashar al-Assad.

In recent days, rebel forces have captured a number of villages in the Jabal Akrad, a mountainous district in the north of the province.

The army has hit back, sparking fierce fighting that has left dozens dead on both sides, according to the Observatory.

In Aleppo province, further east, government troops stormed a village overnight, killing 12 people, the Observatory said.

Fierce fighting also erupted during the night between government troops and rebels in the Barzeh neighbourhood of Damascus, the Britain-based watchdog said.

The army shelled both Barzeh and the Jubar district of the capital, it added.

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The Opposition Advances in Damascus

Despite significant gains in Homs province, Syrian government forces are struggling against opposition forces on other fronts. In Damascus, opposition forces have mounted a major offensive, entering many government-held areas and gaining new ground. Although the government has gone on the counter-offensive, opposition forces have been able to maintain their advance and prevented government forces from storming a number of critical areas in the city. These gains reveal the extent to which the opposition is able to adapt to changes in the operating environment, and prove that the Syrian government lacks the capacity to conclusively defeat the insurgency despite increased assistance from external allies.

The media is focused on the battle for Homs, and consequently the Syrian government appears strong with current momentum moving in its favor. The government’s imminent victory at Homs is indeed significant for efforts to consolidate its primary line of communication from the coastal region through Homs to Damascus; however, reports of government strength are misleading as indicators of the overall campaign for Syria. Such reports overlook critical opposition victories across other fronts. The Syrian government has had to consolidate resources and reinforcements in Homs province, and have diverted attention from important opposition activities, particularly in Damascus. At a time when the opposition is reeling from the loss of Homs and struggling to counter the impacts of greater Hezbollah and Iranian support, it has nonetheless made significant gains in Damascus, proving that the Syrian government lacks the capacity to conclusively defeat its insurgency.

Beginning on July 24, rebel forces launched a major offensive in Damascus city. Despite the Syrian government’s continuous bombardment of Jobar, Barzeh, and Qaboun, rebels managed to push into the Jobar neighborhood, and from there began a concerted drive into government-held districts in the city.[1] After major clashes between government and rebel forces, the opposition took control of the Abbassiyeen garages, an important government-controlled facility.[2] Continuing their push, rebel forces then took control of a major electrical facility just south of Ruken al-Din, and are now laying siege to a large tank park belong to Branch 211 in southern Qaboun using homemade rockets. In Barzeh, the opposition has also advanced on regime positions with major clashes occurring near the Military School and main government managerial buildings.[3] Although clashes are still ongoing in many of these neighborhoods, the opposition has moved into government-held territory previously thought to be impenetrable. While the overall operational value of such victories may be limited, the area has a large military presence and is symbolically important as it nears the Defense Ministry and the Officer’s Club.

By July 26, the Syrian government increased its aerial bombardment of the Jobar, Qaboun, and Barzeh neighborhoods in an attempt to push back the rebel offensive. The next day, government troops conducted a counter-offensive into Barzeh in an attempt to push back the opposition. However, rebel forces were able to hold their ground. The regime offensive has stalled as the opposition has blocked all attempts to storm the neighborhood.[4] Since this time, government and opposition forces have been engaged in major clashes with significantly higher numbers of casualties on both sides than is typical for battles in Damascus.[5] The scale and duration of fighting in these neighborhoods point to the limited capacity of the government, security forces especially as it has had to divert reinforcements to Homs province. This marks the first time that opposition groups have been able to push into three different government-held areas, achieving significant gains in each, while simultaneously maintaining its current operations against major regime targets in the city including Damascus International and Mezze airports.

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Op zaterdag 10 augustus 2013 08:54 schreef paddy het volgende:
Nieuws van 6 augustus wat ik toevallig tegenkwam

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Bron

Ik zocht eigenlijk iets anders, maar kwam dit tegen. Nergens anders gelezen, maar kan ook aan mij liggen. Weg geweest. Mensen bewust uithongeren door blokkade . Ontvoeringen?

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Dit doet me langzamerhand aan Rwanda denken

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Op zaterdag 10 augustus 2013 19:33 schreef Frikandelbroodje het volgende:
[ afbeelding ]

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Het artikel gaat verder

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Op zaterdag 10 augustus 2013 19:33 schreef Frikandelbroodje het volgende:
Mij meer aan Joegoslavi�.

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Op zaterdag 10 augustus 2013 19:52 schreef TargaFlorio het volgende:

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En die wijken die niet ingekleurd zin?

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Ik wist overigens niet dat de rebellen zoveel gebied in handen hebben.

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Zaterdag dreigde president Masoud Barzani van Iraaks Koerdistan met ingrijpen in Syri�. Hij liet weten Koerden in Syri� te zullen beschermen als blijkt dat de bevolkingsgroep doelwit is van strijders met banden met terreurorganisatie al-Qaeda.

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Iraqi Kurd leader Massoud Barzani issues Syria warning

The president of Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdistan region has threatened to intervene to defend the Kurdish population caught up in Syria's unrest.

Massoud Barzani said if Kurds were "under threat of death and terrorism" then Iraqi Kurdistan would be "prepared to defend them".

Recent fighting between Kurds and Islamist anti-government forces has left dozens dead in northern Syria.

Kurds make up about 10% of the Syrian population.

Massoud Barzani called for a delegation to visit the Kurdish areas in Syria
They are largely concentrated in the north-east, towards the Turkish border.

The areas have been run by Kurdish local councils and militia since President Bashar al-Assad's forces withdrew last year.

More than 100,000 people have been killed in the 28-month conflict in Syria, with a further 1.7 million Syrians forced to seek shelter in neighbouring countries, according to UN estimates.

'All capabilities'
Syrian Kurdish militia have been engaged in fierce fighting recently with the jihadists of the anti-Assad al-Nusra Front.

Mr Barzani called for a delegation to visit the Kurdish areas in Syria.

He said if the delegation found evidence of "terrorists" killing Kurds, then Iraqi Kurdistan would "make use of all its capabilities to defend the Kurdish women, children and citizens in western Kurdistan".

Mr Barzani gave no details of what form any intervention might take.

Iraqi Kurdistan comprises three provinces in northern Iraq. It has its own military and police force.

Syria's ethnic Kurdish minority has faced decades of discrimination and marginalisation under Assad rule, with Syrian Kurds staging their own anti-government protests after the Syria conflict began in March 2011.

But most of the fighting recently has been against Islamist rebels.

Last month a prominent Syrian Kurdish politician, Isa Huso, was killed by a car bomb in the north-eastern town of Qamishli.

Kurdish militiamen responded with a call to arms to fight jihadists.

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Op zaterdag 10 augustus 2013 20:35 schreef Frikandelbroodje het volgende:

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Onduidelijk, omdat er weinig mensen wonen, of gewoon in handen van het regime.

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In de stad en random Damascus bedoel je? Is al maanden zo. Het kaartje geeft soms wel een beetje een vertekend beeld omdat een groot gedeelte van het bruingekleurde oosten officieel niet bij Damascus hoort maar onderdeel is van Ghouta, zie dit: http://wikimapia.org/#lan(...)n=36.460876&z=11&m=b

Maar dat de rebellen wel degelijk een flinke foothold hebben in de stad Damascus zelf is gewoon een feit.