Syria Spotlight: Coalition Reacts to Insurgent Break-Away

Scott Lucas – EAworldview – 26-9-2013 – Wednesday’s break-away by at least 11 insurgent groups, rejecting the opposition Syrian National Coalition and Supreme Military Council, has brought a response from Anas Al Abda, a member of the Coalition’s Political Committee.

Al Abda said the “timing of the statement released by the Islamic brigades yesterday was not appropriate at all”, as a Coalition delegation was in New York for the annual meeting of the United Nations General Assembly.

Video of the statement from the insurgent groups:

Al Abda maintained, “The brigades that signed the statement do not represent the most important Free Syrian Army brigades on the ground; there are large brigades that did not sign the statement.”He continued, “Suggesting such ideas and prescribing a specific color to the type of governance at this time causes rifts among the revolutionaries and brings into the question the strength of the revolution inside and outside Syria.”Al Abda also declared that the groups had erred in including Jabhat al-Nusra in their staetment because the faction “is tied to Al Qaeda [and] has a working agenda that is not Syrian”.

Russian Deputy FM: Syria’s Chemical Weapons Won’t Be Brought To Russia For Destruction

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said Thursday that Russia would help with the destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons but the weapons would be dismantled in Syria.

“We consider it optimal that the annihilation [of the chemical weapons] is carried out on Syrian territory, the more so because the convention on the prohibition of chemical weapons, to which Syria has become a party, forbids the transfer of chemical weapons across state borders,” Ryabkov told reporters at the Russia Arms Expo 2013.

About the Author – Scott Lucas Scott Lucas is a professor of American Studies at the University of Birmingham and editor-in-chief of EA WorldView. He is a specialist in US and British foreign policy and international relations, especially the Middle East and Iran. Formerly he worked as a journalist in the US, writing for newspapers including the Guardian and The Independent and was an essayist for The New Statesman before he founded EA WorldView in 2009.

http://eaworldview.com/2013/09/syria-test/