Ghalioun transparently talks about challenges facing the revolution, criticizes the coalition and gives possible solutions
In an interview with Zaman Alwasl, Burhan Ghalioun, the former leader of the Syrian National Council, talked about different subjects affecting the Syrian revolution and tried to find solutions for some of them.
Ghalioun finds that the most important benefit the opposition got from going to Geneva2 was exposing the regime’s reality in front of the international community and Lakhdar Ibrahimi, as its intentions to sort out the crisis only military had clearly appeared.
Ghalioun added another benefit of going to Genev2, as it stopped the ongoing talks about preparation for the conference to reach to peaceful solution, which used to cover the international community ignorance to the Syrian crisis, and put all support to opposition on hold for more than a year. “Now, after Genev2, it is clear that there is no political solution in forthcoming period, and there is a need for new political and military initiatives”, Ghalioun Summarized.
In regard to rumors about annoyance caused to the UN and Arab League envoy, Lakhdar Brahimi, by Bashar Jaafari, the Syrian representative in the UN, Ghalioun commented that Brahimi was put in a difficult position when Jaafari and Syrian delegates were not ready for delegation and kept wasting time, but the annoying matter was when Jaafari accused Brahimi of taking the opposition side and he kept giving Brahimi the definition of “facilitator” instead of “mediator”.
Ghalion was satisfied in regard to the Syrian coalition performance in Geneva2. “the delegations team was better than expected, especially it was not representative to all opposition parties as it was planned, moreover, we were worried from the lack of experience in delegation compared to the regime team” Ghalioun added.
Ghalioun talked about the opposition in general and presented his point of view in its performance and work transparently and in details, he found that Syrian revolution has led to establishing three main bodies “the Coalition, the Free Syrian Army and the Interim government”, which in theory must help and support the revolution. However, according to Ghalioun, those bodies till now suffer from serious problems and not up to what expected from them.
Ghalioun advised that National Coalition needed to improve its image which had deteriorated significantly and its performance needed improving. Ghalioun found that Coalition needed to restore its unity and recruit other political and experienced figures regardless to political quotas. “the Coalition needs to review its rules of procedures to change the decision making body which is restricted to the head of the coalition and the General Secretariat, it needs support with agenda and a wise distribution of roles to implement it, it needs to find a democratic and transparent method in decision making at all levels with follow up frameworks” added. He advised running regular meetings for questioning and following up the financial spending and determining responsibilities for lagging back in doing required jobs, or wrong decisions. The political expert found that if the situation kept unclear and decision had been taken according to personal wishes and modes, then no improvement could be achieved . “Lack of achievement and helplessness is the main description for the Coalition performance, and if things still in this way, we might see Fridays calling for overthrowing the Coalition” Ghalioun said.
“In the same time, there is an urgent need to give the interest and support to the Military Higher Council because it manages the armed battalions, which are the most important component in Syrian revolution” Ghalioun said and added: “regrettably, instead of benefitting from the support has been intended to be sent from the friend countries after the apparent fail of Geneva2, the unwise, quick and reactive decisions led to deepening the dividing among the Free Syrian Army leaderships, what we need in this field is fast movement toward reforming and reorganizing the military battalions and finding an effective, professional and responsible military leadership working in battle field, beside securing better arming on both quality and quantity aspects”.
Ghalioun thinks that an urgent solution must be found to sort out the acute division and conflict within the leadership of the FSA which happened after a wave of uncertain shifting in the leadership and members of the Military Council. He thinks that solution need to start with uniting the military opinions and effort and cooperating with the battalions fighting in battle field, and following up their work and military plans.
He advises that better solution would be in meetings between members of the military Council and battalions and military leaders, to review mistakes and assure responsibility in front of Syrian people, besides cancelling wrong decisions and finding a base for mutual and continuous cooperation and coordination between the Military leadership and the political leaders. An agenda for the Free Syrian Army must be put forward and discussed to reform, organize and support it.
Ghalioun sees the National Coalition is helpless in supporting the Syrian people and the Revolution, even in improving itself and its performance, “it failed in becoming an effective organization, till now, its meeting still run to discuss its rules of procedures, structure, and other detailed issues and it hardly discuss the important issues which it was founded to resolve them. “Therefore, instead of helping the revolution, the National Coalition has become a heavy burden on the revolution. In general the National Coalition does not help people in need, refugees, wounded and their families, martyrs’ families, following up students’ welfare, looking after millions of lost and orphan children, even the Coalition does not give fighter the support and fund they need. therefore, all Syrians feel the distance between them and the Coalition, and that why most of the time the Coalition’s members are accused of luxurious life they live on the expense of Syrians pain, which is not true, but that reflects the wide distance between people and the Coalition.
Ghalioun does not think that finding another political body instead of the national Coalition could benefit the revolution, as it might be difficult to get the community, public and international recognition of the proposed new body.
He explained: “till now, there is no general awareness of the political and collective mentality, always people think of people and figures and think the problem lay in them, and they forget the frameworks, the procedures and structures of an organization. The root of the problem is lacking experience of working as a team”.
In regard to Russia and its support to Syrian regime, Ghalioun said that he went to Russia 4 times, and met the Foreign Minister, “in the last meeting, which was the longest, I found that Russia has abandoned the 2118 regulation and would not abide by it. Lavrov said it plainly that differences between the opposition and the regime are big enough to make it impossible to form a transitional government with full capacity, and he advised to work on Geneva1 articles by forming different groups”. Ghalioun replied and added that point of view was the same one the regime delegation team adopted during Geneva2, as they insisted on refusing the point that calling to change the regime if a political changes are to happen in Syria, the option is forming a national united government under the regime umbrella, without affecting al-Assad, the Syrian National Army and security, In other word, they call the opposition to join the criminal regime.
“I feel that Russian attitude from the Syrian revolution has become worse that 3 years ago and closer to Bashar than the opposition, all that happened as a result of letting down the opposition by many allies and the attempts to hold its military advance since mid 2012, when the regime was in real threat, under claims of finding political solutions. “ We and Arabs are now paying for the mistake USA made when it relied on Russia to find a political solution” Ghalioun detailed.
About the USA position within the Syrian crisis, Ghalioun thought that USA is now under very difficult dilemma, as it has been waiting for the regime to hand in all the chemical weapon, because USA stopped the arbitral attack on condition of handing the chemical weapon. “But Assad regime is trying to buy time and hiding some of the chemical weapon. Moreover, it ignores implementing the UN 2139 regulation, which called for stopping the use on Barrel bombs, stopping torture in prisons, establishing humanitarian corridors for distributing aid, have put USA in more difficult position”, added.
Ghalioun sees that Ukrainian crisis has benefited Russia and turned the game rules upside-down, and put it in better position. Russia since the beginning of Syrian crisis, kept justifying its attitude toward Syrian crisis with Iraqi and Libyan scenarios, but in Ukraine, it turned the table against the West and forced its position against them and challenged their will either in Syrian or Crimea. Both Syrian and Ukrainian crisis reflect the weakness in the west policy under Obama’s leadership. “if situation kept like this, the west would need to either give up to Russia or going to war” Ghalioun thinks.
In regard to the disagreement between Saudi Arabia and Qatar, Ghalioun said: “of course that disagreement has affected the Syrian revolution, because weak coordination and division will waste efforts and lead to division in the revolution leadership, which could affect the rebels’ performance in battle field. From our side, we are trying to avoid effects of the Gulf disagreement on the Syrian revolution as much as possible”
Ghalioun is worried from the change in Egyptian attitude and support for Syrians, as the government started to request entry permissions for Syrian. He is afraid of resuming the cooperation between the Syrian and Egyptian security forces.
Ghalioun ended the interview expressing his trust in Syrian people and the strength of Syrian social fiber, and kicking ISIS away was best example of Syrians awareness against extremism. By Abdullah Raja; Translation by Yusra Ahmed
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