Syria: Kofi Annan meeting Bashar al-Assad over broken peace plan

July 9th, 2012

FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda

Assad said the Annan plan had failed to stop bloodshed because “many
countries don’t want it to succeed.”

Annan arrived in Damascus on Sunday for his third visit since he was tasked in
February with brokering an end to the conflict, according to his
Geneva-based office.

“The Joint Special Envoy for Syria, Kofi Annan, arrived in Damascus late
Sunday for talks with President Bashar Al-Assad,” said his spokesman
Ahmad Fawzi.

Syrian foreign ministry spokesman Jihad Makdissi told AFP that Annan would
hold talks about his six-point plan with leaders in Damascus.

His decision to travel to Damascus and hold talks with Assad was criticised by
the SNC, the main opposition group in exile which cited the high death toll
since they agreed an April 12 ceasefire.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group based in Britain,
estimates that 5,898 people have been killed since the truce was announced.

“In this context, Annan chose to meet with the symbols of the Syrian
regime, while abstaining from the Friends of Syria conference in Paris,”
the SNC said, asserting that Syrians “cannot justify these steps”.

The Council also questioned Annan’s support for Iran to play a diplomatic
role, saying that “Tehran’s support for its allies in the Syrian regime
makes them partners in the aggression on the Syrian people.”

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, for his part, has accused the United
States and its allies of opposing Assad’s regime with the goal of dominating
the Middle East and propping up Israel.

Iran’s deputy foreign minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian said any attack on
Syria would be “stupid” and “catastrophic.”

The comments followed US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s warning that
time was running out to save Syria from a “catastrophic assault”.

“The sooner there can be an end to the violence and a begetting of a
political transition process, not only will fewer people die, but there’s a
chance to save the Syrian state from a catastrophic assault that would be
dangerous not only to the country, but the region,” she told reporters
on Sunday.

“It should be abundantly clear to those who support the Assad regime
their days are numbered,” Clinton said.

Meanwhile, the Syrian navy staged live fire exercises at the weekend to “simulate
the scenario of repelling a sudden attack from the sea,” state news
agency SANA reported.

Republican US Senator John McCain on Sunday took President Barack Obama’s
administration to task for what he called its “shameful and disgraceful”
response to the bloodshed in Syria.

“The fact is that the United States has played no leadership role,”
McCain told CBS television, referring to efforts to halt Syria’s crackdown.

On the ground Monday, the Syrian army clashes with rebels in several main
cities across the country, including the capital Damascus, Deir Ezzor in the
east and Homs in central Syria, the Observatory said.

The Khaldiyeh neighbourhood of Homs came under fierce shelling by regime
forces attempting to storm the rebel stronghold.

In the northern city of Aleppo, battles between the two took place in several
neighbourhoods, while a roadside bomb targeting a security patrol killed two
members of the security forces.

Regime forces also bombarded areas in rural Damascus and the southern province
of Daraa, where clashes broke out near the Jordanian border, the watchdog
said.

More than 17,000 people have now died since the uprising began in March last
year, according to the Observatory. The figure is impossible to verify, and
the UN has stopped keeping a toll.

Source: AFP