Tuesday, 17 January 2012
The training of the Arab League observers is to be carried out by staff of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights. (Reuters)
Western diplomats said a new Russian draft resolution on the violence in Syria handed to the U.N. Security Council on Monday was confusing as the United Nations said that it would start training Arab League observers monitoring the deadly crackdown in Syria within days.
The diplomats said that the draft did not make clear if Moscow would accept tough language demanded by the West.
They said experts from the 15 council members would meet on Tuesday to discuss the Russian text, an amalgam of rival wording proposals. It is the third version that Moscow has presented in the past month, according to Reuters.
The diplomats said that the draft did not make clear if Moscow would accept tough language demanded by the West.
They said experts from the 15 council members would meet on Tuesday to discuss the Russian text, an amalgam of rival wording proposals. It is the third version that Moscow has presented in the past month, according to Reuters.
Council members have been divided for months over the uprising against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, with Western countries pushing for strong condemnation of the government’s bloody crackdown but Russia seeking to shield its ally Damascus.
In October, Russia and China vetoed a European-drafted resolution that threatened possible sanctions. Russia presented its own draft on Dec. 15 and Western countries agreed to discuss and negotiate it, but there has been little progress since then.
Western diplomats have said they cannot accept Russian wording that assigns equal blame to both government and opposition for the 10 months of violence in Syria the United Nations says has killed more than 5,000 people, mostly civilians.
They have accused Russia of failing to negotiate seriously, in a bid to buy time for Damascus. Russia, for its part, has said it wants to avoid any resolution that could pave the way for Western intervention in Syria, as happened in Libya.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called on the Security Council on Monday to handle Syria “in a coherent manner.”
The text circulated on Monday ran to 10 pages, compared with two for Russia’s last draft on Dec. 23. But that reflected the new version’s page layout and the fact that it incorporated a string of alternative paragraphs proposed by European countries, with no sign that Russia accepted them.
One paragraph, for instance, demands that the Syrian government “immediately put an end to attacks ... against those exercising their rights to freedom of expression, peaceful assembly and association.” The draft ascribes the wording to France and Portugal without making clear if Moscow will agree.
Other paragraphs echo earlier Russian drafts in calling for an end to violence by all sides, backing a peace initiative by the Arab League, which has sent a monitoring mission to Syria, and urging Damascus to carry out promised reforms.
One Western diplomat said the latest text might only amount to a “slight tweak” to earlier Russia drafts. “I’m not sure any of the amendments are highly significant,” he said.
He and other Western diplomats said they hoped to know more after Tuesday's meeting of experts -- U.N. jargon for mid-ranking diplomats authorized to hammer out wording but not make policy decisions. “We’ll have to go through it and work out where we go from here,” the diplomat said.
In October, Russia and China vetoed a European-drafted resolution that threatened possible sanctions. Russia presented its own draft on Dec. 15 and Western countries agreed to discuss and negotiate it, but there has been little progress since then.
Western diplomats have said they cannot accept Russian wording that assigns equal blame to both government and opposition for the 10 months of violence in Syria the United Nations says has killed more than 5,000 people, mostly civilians.
They have accused Russia of failing to negotiate seriously, in a bid to buy time for Damascus. Russia, for its part, has said it wants to avoid any resolution that could pave the way for Western intervention in Syria, as happened in Libya.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called on the Security Council on Monday to handle Syria “in a coherent manner.”
The text circulated on Monday ran to 10 pages, compared with two for Russia’s last draft on Dec. 23. But that reflected the new version’s page layout and the fact that it incorporated a string of alternative paragraphs proposed by European countries, with no sign that Russia accepted them.
One paragraph, for instance, demands that the Syrian government “immediately put an end to attacks ... against those exercising their rights to freedom of expression, peaceful assembly and association.” The draft ascribes the wording to France and Portugal without making clear if Moscow will agree.
Other paragraphs echo earlier Russian drafts in calling for an end to violence by all sides, backing a peace initiative by the Arab League, which has sent a monitoring mission to Syria, and urging Damascus to carry out promised reforms.
One Western diplomat said the latest text might only amount to a “slight tweak” to earlier Russia drafts. “I’m not sure any of the amendments are highly significant,” he said.
He and other Western diplomats said they hoped to know more after Tuesday's meeting of experts -- U.N. jargon for mid-ranking diplomats authorized to hammer out wording but not make policy decisions. “We’ll have to go through it and work out where we go from here,” the diplomat said.
Training Arab observers
Meanwhile, the United Nations said Monday that it would start training Arab League observers monitoring the deadly crackdown in Syria within days.
A formal request for help has been made by the Arab League and the U.N. has agreed to start the training in Cairo after League foreign ministers meet this weekend, a U.N. spokeswoman, Vannina Maestracci, told AFP.
The training is to be carried out by staff of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Maestracci said.
“At the request of the League of Arab States, the OHCHR has agreed to train observers and will deploy to Cairo to do this training,” she said.
A report by the observer mission is to be handed over to Arab League ministers on Thursday and the ministers will meet on Saturday in Cairo to decide the future of the mission.
Maestracci said the training had been scheduled to start earlier but was delayed at the request of the Arab League until after the ministerial meeting.
The U.N. said in early January that it was ready to help the observer mission, which has faced widespread criticism from the Syrian opposition, but that it was waiting for a request from the Arab League.
The spokeswoman was unable to say how many observers would be trained or how many U.N. experts would be involved.
The U.N. says that at least 5,400 people have been killed in Syria since President Bashar al-Assad’s crackdown on opposition protests started in March last year.
A formal request for help has been made by the Arab League and the U.N. has agreed to start the training in Cairo after League foreign ministers meet this weekend, a U.N. spokeswoman, Vannina Maestracci, told AFP.
The training is to be carried out by staff of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Maestracci said.
“At the request of the League of Arab States, the OHCHR has agreed to train observers and will deploy to Cairo to do this training,” she said.
A report by the observer mission is to be handed over to Arab League ministers on Thursday and the ministers will meet on Saturday in Cairo to decide the future of the mission.
Maestracci said the training had been scheduled to start earlier but was delayed at the request of the Arab League until after the ministerial meeting.
The U.N. said in early January that it was ready to help the observer mission, which has faced widespread criticism from the Syrian opposition, but that it was waiting for a request from the Arab League.
The spokeswoman was unable to say how many observers would be trained or how many U.N. experts would be involved.
The U.N. says that at least 5,400 people have been killed in Syria since President Bashar al-Assad’s crackdown on opposition protests started in March last year.
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