BEIRUT: A decision by Western and Arab countries to arm rebels fighting to topple Syria’s President Bashar
Al Assad poses a danger to peace talks, the Syrian foreign minister said yesterday.
Walid Al Moualem told a news conference in Damascus that the opposition had little hope of matching the Syrian army’s strength despite a pledge by the states that make up the “Friends of Syria” to increase military support to the rebels.
“If they expect or fantasise that they can create a balance of power, I think they will need to wait years for that to happen,” he said during the televised news conference.
Western and Arab countries as well as Turkey, who have thrown their weight behind the opposition, said their decision to arm the rebels was to rebalance the conflict in which more than 93,000 people have been killed, most of them civilians.
Assad is seen as having gained momentum, seizing a strategic town near the Lebanese border which helps him cement control between the capital Damascus and his stronghold on the Mediterranean coast.
Moualem said that a move towards openly giving military support to the rebels would encourage terrorism and that radical Islamist groups linked to Al Qaeda would benefit
the most.
“The decision is dangerous...because it aims to prolong the crisis, to extend the violence and the killing, and to encourage the terrorists to carry out their crimes,” he said.
REUTERS
