Russia Opposes Calls for Assad to Quit
Russia opposes Western calls for Syria's president to step down and will send a delegation to Syria to meet the opposing sides, the Interfax news agency said Friday citing a source and a lawmaker.
"We do not support such calls and believe it is now that President Bashar Assad's regime needs to be given time to implement all the reform processes that have been announced," Interfax quoted a ministry source as saying.
The comes came a day after U.S. President Barack Obama and other major leaders such as British Prime Minister David Cameron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel called on Assad to quit.
Obama also slapped harsh new sanctions on Syria, freezing state assets and blacklisting the oil and gas sector, in an escalation of pressure aimed at halting a bloody crackdown on protests that has claimed more than 2,000 lives.
The foreign ministry source said Assad's announcement of an amnesty for political prisoners and his declared readiness to hold a general election by the year's end were among the moves aimed at reform.
His pledge to halt the crackdown on protesters was the most important signal yet of his willingness to pursue change, the source said.
Earlier this week Assad, speaking to U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon, announced that his security forces had ended their deadly crackdown on dissent.
"This is a very important step forward, and it speaks to the intention of Assad and the Syrian authorities to move along the path of reforms," Interfax quoted the foreign ministry source as saying.
"We support this and encourage Syrians in every way possible to move in this direction," the source said, adding that the Syrian regime "needs to be given time for them to be able to implement all these steps."
Russian senator Aslambek Aslakhanov told the news agency separately that a Russian delegation would be going to Syria on a reconnaissance mission because media reports out of the country were contradictory and incomplete.
"Subject to agreement with the Russian foreign ministry, a group of Russian politicians and members of the Federation Council will fly out to Syria in the coming days to see on the ground what is going in the country," he said.
"Our task is to hold meetings with representatives of the acting authorities, including the opposition," said the senator, a member of the international committee of the Federation Council, the parliament's upper house.
"We are planning to meet with President Bashar Assad whom I know well," he told Interfax.
Damascus is one of Russia's strongest allies in the Middle East, with ties dating back to the Soviet era.
In May 2010, Medvedev became the first ever Russian or Soviet head of state to travel to Damascus where he promised Assad help in developing Syria's oil and gas infrastructure and voiced readiness to build a nuclear power station there.
Source: Agence France Presse
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