DUSHANBE, February 22, 2016, Asia-Plus – On Saturday February 20, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said he is ready for a ceasefire, on condition “terrorists” did not use a lull in fighting to their advantage and that countries backing insurgents halted support for them.
“We have said that we are ready to stop military operations, but the issue relates to more important factors … such as preventing terrorists from using it to improve their positions,” Assad told Spanish newspaper
El Pais
in an interview on February 20.
He also said any truce must ensure that “other countries, especially Turkey, are prevented from sending more terrorists and weapons, or any kind of logistical support.”
Syrian president noted that the Russian and the Iranian support were essential for the government army to make advancement. “To say that we couldn’t have made it is a hypothetical question, because it’s an “if,” so nobody knows the real answer of the “if.” But we definitely need that help for a simple reason: because more than 80 countries supported those terrorists in different ways, some of them directly with money, with logistical support, with armaments, with recruitments. Some other countries supported them politically, in different international forums. Syria is a small country. We could fight, but in the end, there’s unlimited support and recruitment for those terrorists. You definitely need international support. But, again, this is a hypothetical question I cannot answer,” President Assad said.
Syrian president noted that they don’t have any evidence that the Russians attacked any civilian targets. “They are very precise in their targets and they always attack, every day, the bases or the targets of the terrorists. Actually, it’s the Americans who did this, who killed many civilians in the northeastern part of Syria, not the Russians. Not a single incident has happened regarding the civilians so far, because they don’t attack in the cities; they attack mainly in the rural areas,” he said.
Asked about the possibility of Turkey and Saudi Arabia sending ground forces into Syria, Assad said: “We”re going to deal with them like we deal with the terrorists. We”re going to defend our country. This is aggression.”
Assad told
El Pais
his troops were now close to fully controlling the northern city of Aleppo and were advancing towards the Islamic State stronghold of Raqqa province.
Once he has control of the country, Assad also said in the interview, the next step would be to form a national unity government that would lay the groundwork for a new constitution and general elections.
We will recall that attempts to negotiate a truce in recent months have failed. The latest round of talks at the United Nations in Geneva is being jointly chaired by Russia and the United States. World powers agreed in Munich on February 12 to a cessation of hostilities that would let humanitarian aid be delivered in Syria. The ceasefire was scheduled to start a week later, but did not take effect.
