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U.S. pressures Syria to fall in line on Lebanon, Iraq
USA TODAY
Wednesday, Sep 21, 2005
By Barbara Slavin
The United States is increasing pressure on Syria, using harsher words
and pointed diplomacy to get President Bashar Assad's government to
stop aiding Iraqi insurgents.
Recently, Bush administration officials met for the second time with a
Syrian opposition leader who favors Assad's replacement by a
democratic government.
At the United Nations on Monday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
chaired a meeting on shoring up Lebanese democracy that excluded
Syria, long the power broker there, and Emile Lahoud, Lebanon's
Syrian-backed president.
Last week, President Bush said the United States would work with
allies to further isolate Syria, already subject to U.S. trade and
investment sanctions. The U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad,
accused Syria of harboring training camps for insurgents and said
U.S. patience was running out.
Several Syria experts say the Bush administration has started to plan
for a Syria without Assad at its helm, but some warn that the
alternatives could be even worse.
"The administration is scouting," says Kenneth Katzman, a Middle East
expert at the Congressional Research Service in Washington. "There's
no Chalabi out there," he adds, referring to Ahmad Chalabi, an Iraqi
exile leader who promoted the overthrow of Saddam Hussein and is now a
deputy prime minister in Iraq.
Last month, Farid Ghadry, a Syrian-American who heads an opposition
group called the Reform Party of Syria, met for an hour with the head
of the National Security Council's Middle East section.
Ghadry says he and Michael Scott Doran discussed the "transition from
an autocracy to a democracy and why a transitional parliament is an
important element" of that change. It was his second meeting with U.S.
officials; in March, he went to the State Department to discuss
Syria's future.
His party claims to have offices in 18 countries, including an
underground office in Syria, and operates a Cyprus-based radio station
that broadcasts into Syria.
U.S. officials began anticipating the fall of Assad when Syrian troops
were forced to withdraw from Lebanon in April after the Feb. 14
assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri, Katzman
says.
Hariri supporters charge that Syria was behind the murder. A
U.N. investigation has led to the arrest of four pro-Syrian Lebanese
security officials. Investigators led by German Judge Detlev Mehlis
went to Damascus on Tuesday to interview Syrian officials about the
crime.
The meetings with Ghadry and the administration's decision to grant
visas to two Syrian reformers to attend a May conference in Washington
show the administration is in "the very early stages" of planning for
regime change in Syria, Katzman says.
Appropriations bills for the fiscal year that begins in October
promote democracy in Syria, he says. A House version allocates as much
as $1.5 million; the Senate version does not specify an amount.
U.S. officials want Assad out of power because they don't believe he
will stop the flow of fighters from Syria to Iraq, says Flynt
Leverett, a former member of the National Security Council in the
Clinton and current Bush administrations.
Administration officials declined repeated requests for comment. In
the New York Post on Thursday, Rice said the U.S. intention was still
to change Syria's behavior. "But we'll see whether or not the Syrian
government is smart enough to take that course," she said.
Monday, she told reporters at the U.N. that "Syria needs to get on the
right side of events" by stopping interference in Lebanon and ending
support for Palestinian militants and Iraqi insurgents.
Syria denies it is helping Iraqi insurgents. The United States is not
patrolling the border, while Syria has stationed 10,000 troops there,
says Buthaina Shabaan, Syria's minister of expatriates and an adviser
to Assad. Instead of pushing for Assad's removal, Americans should ask
whether "promoting violence and war is the right way to change
countries and bring freedom and democracy," she says. "Are they
satisfied with the results in Iraq?"
Several Syria experts say Assad's removal could pose new problems.
Theodore Kattouf, U.S. ambassador to Syria until September 2003, warns
of a power vacuum, leading to chaos, or a worse leader, such as
Assad's uncle Rifaat.
Exiled by Assad's late father, Rifaat Assad has long sought power but
would be an unlikely ally for the Bush administration. In 1982, he led
a brutal crackdown on Islamic fundamentalists in the Syrian city of
Hama. An estimated 20,000 people were killed.
Murhaf Jouejati, a Syrian-American professor of political science at
George Washington University, says Rifaat Assad is extremely unpopular
in Syria and that the secular opposition is weak. Jouejati calls
Ghadry a "Chalabi mini-me." The fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood
would take advantage of any instability, he says. "The Bush
administration wants regime change but cannot find a viable
alternative."
Frustration with Assad has been building since the United States
invaded Iraq in March 2003. Edward Djerejian, U.S. ambassador to Syria
under the first Bush administration, met with Assad in January and
urged him to cooperate, just as his father did during the Gulf War in
1991. "He has not made a strategic decision to do so," says Djerejian,
director of the Baker Institute for Public Policy at Rice University.
USA TODAY
Wednesday, Sep 21, 2005
By Barbara Slavin
The United States is increasing pressure on Syria, using harsher words
and pointed diplomacy to get President Bashar Assad's government to
stop aiding Iraqi insurgents.
Recently, Bush administration officials met for the second time with a
Syrian opposition leader who favors Assad's replacement by a
democratic government.
At the United Nations on Monday, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
chaired a meeting on shoring up Lebanese democracy that excluded
Syria, long the power broker there, and Emile Lahoud, Lebanon's
Syrian-backed president.
Last week, President Bush said the United States would work with
allies to further isolate Syria, already subject to U.S. trade and
investment sanctions. The U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad,
accused Syria of harboring training camps for insurgents and said
U.S. patience was running out.
Several Syria experts say the Bush administration has started to plan
for a Syria without Assad at its helm, but some warn that the
alternatives could be even worse.
"The administration is scouting," says Kenneth Katzman, a Middle East
expert at the Congressional Research Service in Washington. "There's
no Chalabi out there," he adds, referring to Ahmad Chalabi, an Iraqi
exile leader who promoted the overthrow of Saddam Hussein and is now a
deputy prime minister in Iraq.
Last month, Farid Ghadry, a Syrian-American who heads an opposition
group called the Reform Party of Syria, met for an hour with the head
of the National Security Council's Middle East section.
Ghadry says he and Michael Scott Doran discussed the "transition from
an autocracy to a democracy and why a transitional parliament is an
important element" of that change. It was his second meeting with U.S.
officials; in March, he went to the State Department to discuss
Syria's future.
His party claims to have offices in 18 countries, including an
underground office in Syria, and operates a Cyprus-based radio station
that broadcasts into Syria.
U.S. officials began anticipating the fall of Assad when Syrian troops
were forced to withdraw from Lebanon in April after the Feb. 14
assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri, Katzman
says.
Hariri supporters charge that Syria was behind the murder. A
U.N. investigation has led to the arrest of four pro-Syrian Lebanese
security officials. Investigators led by German Judge Detlev Mehlis
went to Damascus on Tuesday to interview Syrian officials about the
crime.
The meetings with Ghadry and the administration's decision to grant
visas to two Syrian reformers to attend a May conference in Washington
show the administration is in "the very early stages" of planning for
regime change in Syria, Katzman says.
Appropriations bills for the fiscal year that begins in October
promote democracy in Syria, he says. A House version allocates as much
as $1.5 million; the Senate version does not specify an amount.
U.S. officials want Assad out of power because they don't believe he
will stop the flow of fighters from Syria to Iraq, says Flynt
Leverett, a former member of the National Security Council in the
Clinton and current Bush administrations.
Administration officials declined repeated requests for comment. In
the New York Post on Thursday, Rice said the U.S. intention was still
to change Syria's behavior. "But we'll see whether or not the Syrian
government is smart enough to take that course," she said.
Monday, she told reporters at the U.N. that "Syria needs to get on the
right side of events" by stopping interference in Lebanon and ending
support for Palestinian militants and Iraqi insurgents.
Syria denies it is helping Iraqi insurgents. The United States is not
patrolling the border, while Syria has stationed 10,000 troops there,
says Buthaina Shabaan, Syria's minister of expatriates and an adviser
to Assad. Instead of pushing for Assad's removal, Americans should ask
whether "promoting violence and war is the right way to change
countries and bring freedom and democracy," she says. "Are they
satisfied with the results in Iraq?"
Several Syria experts say Assad's removal could pose new problems.
Theodore Kattouf, U.S. ambassador to Syria until September 2003, warns
of a power vacuum, leading to chaos, or a worse leader, such as
Assad's uncle Rifaat.
Exiled by Assad's late father, Rifaat Assad has long sought power but
would be an unlikely ally for the Bush administration. In 1982, he led
a brutal crackdown on Islamic fundamentalists in the Syrian city of
Hama. An estimated 20,000 people were killed.
Murhaf Jouejati, a Syrian-American professor of political science at
George Washington University, says Rifaat Assad is extremely unpopular
in Syria and that the secular opposition is weak. Jouejati calls
Ghadry a "Chalabi mini-me." The fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood
would take advantage of any instability, he says. "The Bush
administration wants regime change but cannot find a viable
alternative."
Frustration with Assad has been building since the United States
invaded Iraq in March 2003. Edward Djerejian, U.S. ambassador to Syria
under the first Bush administration, met with Assad in January and
urged him to cooperate, just as his father did during the Gulf War in
1991. "He has not made a strategic decision to do so," says Djerejian,
director of the Baker Institute for Public Policy at Rice University.