Sabbagh: Some countries endeavor to target Syria’s national options, unity and integrity

Syria’s permanent representative to the United Nations, Bassam Sabbagh, confirmed that some countries launched a terrorist war of aggression against Syria ten years ago to undermine its national options, sovereignty, unity and territorial integrity through terrorist tools. But thanks to sacrifices of the Syrian Arab Army  and steadfastness of the Syrian people, these aggressive designs have been foiled.

During a session of the UN Security Council on Monday via video,  Sabbagh clarified that some countries, led by the United States, Britain and France, have launched this aggressive, multifaceted and unprecedented war against Syria to target its legitimate government in a grave violation of the principles of international law and provisions of the UN Charter.

Sabbagh pointed out that during the past ten years, these countries have exerted  many efforts to incite the Syrians against each other and spread chaos. They spent huge amounts of money to provoke and prolong the crisis in order to serve the goals of these countries in destabilizing Syria, destroying its civilizational and developmental achievements and fragmenting its territorial integrity. 

Al-Sabbagh stated that these countries have used terrorists as a pretext to form an illegal international coalition to combat terrorism.  In fact the  American administration use this American coalition to direct their attacks against the peoples of the region. The aim of the American coalition isn’t to  combat terrorist organizations created by its country, but to target and kill thousands of innocent civilians, to weaken the capabilities of the Syrian Arab Army, which is actually confronting the terrorist organization “ISIS” and other terrorist organizations. It also aims at devastating the potentials  of the Syrian state by destroying civilian facilities such as schools, hospitals and infrastructure such as power stations, bridges and dams-  which in turn caused an immense human suffering.

Sabbagh noted  that during the past ten years, these countries have allowed terrorist organizations to commit crimes of murder, displacement, demographic change, child recruitment, plunder of oil and cultural property, burning agricultural crops, and depriving people of potable water. Moreover , the Turkish regime imposed the “Turkification” practices in the areas it occupies. These countries continued their political hypocrisy by expressing their “grave concern” due to the humanitarian situation in Syria, while at the same time imposing unilateral coercive measures and tightening their suffocating siege on the Syrian people and working to prevent the reconstruction process. Thus, the real name for those coercive measures becomes “economic terrorism”.

Sabbagh confirmed that those countries used to pay lip service to respecting Syria’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, and that the solution to the crisis was political, not military, while they practiced the most heinous violation of Syria’s sovereignty and independence through the American and Turkish forces’ occupation of areas Syria. 

Sabbagh affirmed that the steadfastness of the Syrian people and and their adherence to their leadership led to the failure of the aggressive plans contrived against Syria during the past ten years. This failure requires those countries to review their policies and to realistically assess the current situation to see the results of their hostile policies in Syria in particular and the region in general. These countries have to take measures to correct those wrong policies and adopt new constructive approaches based on respecting the rules of international law and adopting diplomacy and objective dialogue to restore stability to Syria and to the region.

Sabbagh stressed the need that the United Nations and its special envoy Geir Pederson  have to take a clear stance towards these challenges and to play their role in implementing provisions of UN charter, which Syria was among the countries that participated in drafting it.

Sabbagh stated that the fifteenth round of the Astana meetings was held last month in the Russian city of Sochi and issued a statement that included reaffirming the strong commitment to the sovereignty, unity and territorial integrity of Syria and the continuation of cooperation until the complete elimination of terrorist organizations in it. The statement also stipulated for rejecting the separatist agendas that aim at undermining the sovereignty, unity and integrity of the Syrian territories and the attempts to create new facts on the ground under the pretext of combating terrorism. The statement condemned the Israeli aggression on Syria.

Sabbagh noted that the UN envoy held constructive talks with the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates, Dr. Faisal Al-Miqdad, during his visit  to Damascus on the twenty-second of last month. During the visit, Al-Miqdad reaffirmed Syria’s commitment to a political process with Syrian ownership and leadership facilitated by the United Nations in accordance with the relevant Security Council resolutions, which all affirm strong commitment to the sovereignty, independence, unity and territorial integrity of Syria.

He added that making the work of the Committee of Discussing the Constitution a success requires respecting its rules of procedures and rejecting any external interference in its work or any attempts to impose dictates about its work conclusions or pre-set timetables for the accomplishment of its mission.

Inas Abdulkareem