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World stands by as Syria reaches tipping point

John J. Metzler
THESE are tumultuous times in Syria. Civil war has engulfed the country, fierce fighting plagues the capital of Damascus, a bomb blast decimated the ruling regime's top security chiefs, and the Arab League called on President Bashar al-Assad to step down. But as the world watches in suspended animation, the UN Security Council remains checkmated by Russian and Chinese support for the regime. Syria on the crossroads of the Middle East is heading full-throttle towards the abyss.
Civil war confronts the forty year plus Assad family rule. For the past 17 months, emboldened by the “Arab Spring,” the violence has increased and over 20,000 people mostly civilians have been killed and according to the UN over one million people have been displaced inside the country. An additional 42,000 refugees are in neighbouring Turkey, 35,000 in Jordan and 32,000 in Lebanon.
The ruling regime which is based in the Alawite sect of Islam (closer to that of Iran), and at odds with the majority Sunni, battles on with the ferocity of a cornered mongoose.
Significant UN Security Council actions to sanction Assad have been stopped short on three occasions, by double vetoes of Russia and China. First in October, then in February and now in July, cautiously optimistic US and British diplomacy was jolted by the riveting realpolitik that both Russia and Mainland China are still willing to
give Assad diplomatic cover fire in the Security Council despite the growing political collateral damage throughout much of the Arab world.
Knowing the political intransigence of both Moscow and Beijing towards any serious action by the Security Council, former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan made a mission to Moscow hat in hand to see Vladimir Putin. Annan was trying to revive his moribund peace plan, while at the same time trying to encourage Russian flexibility and support for a unified approach to Syria. His answer was Nyet. Additionally 300 UN military observers are now going to be phased out.
In the meantime globetrotting Secretary General Ban Ki-moon arrived in Beijing to try to persuade the PRC rulers to soften its stance backing the Syrian regime.
After the double veto, British Ambassador Sir Mark Lyall Grant stated he was “appalled by the decision of Russia and China to veto this resolution aimed at ending the bloodshed in Syria.” American Ambassador Susan Rice rightly called it “a dark day,” but that does not belie the Obama Administration's amateurish inconsistency in the UN.
Despite the stunning diplomatic setback in the Security Council, Hillary Clinton's State Department rationalises that such votes will shame Russia and the People's Republic of China; as if Vladimir Putin or Hu Jintao really care?
As Richard Haass, president of the New York's prestigious Council on Foreign Relations advised, “The United States and other like minded government should not equate the United Nations with multilateralism, nor should they see the UN as having a monopoly on legitimacy.”
But why do Russia and China still back the dictator Assad in the face of growing opposition in the Arab world? Since the 1960’s Syria was close ally of the old Soviet Union and still relies on Moscow. Russia sees Syria as a regional firewall against the spread of separatism and sectarianism.
For China there's some of the same logic; keeping the lid on restive ethnic, religious and national groups inside the confines of the People's Republic.
Of course there's the Iran connection. Though Assad's Syria is a secular
state, the ruling Alawite minority in Damascus are close to Iranian Islam. Syria's remains the Islamic Republic's sole serious ally in the Arab world and thus a loss of Assad would be a stunning setback to Tehran. Senator Marco Rubio (R-Florida) has regularly stressed the strategic significance of Iran's loss of its Syrian satrap.
Put in a geopolitical perspective, Syria's loss to Russia would mirror the US' loss of secular Egypt, and France’s setback in Tunisia.
Ominously as the endgame approaches, we are reminded that Syria holds a major supply of chemical and biological weapons. Should Assad cross the threshold and use them, foreign intervention would become near certain.
Yet sectarian violence could be on the horizon. Syria remains a complex country of many faiths, sects and minorities including about two million Christians. Given harassment of Christians in post-Mubarak Egypt for example, Syria's Christians have ample reason for concern and fears for the future.
Shaping the outcome of the Syrian crisis is ultimately up the Free Syrian Army and fragmented opposition. It is not America’s responsibility to open the political Pandora's Box in Damascus.
The writer is a United Nations correspondent covering diplomatic and defence issues. He is the author of Transatlantic Divide: USA/Euroland Rift? (University Press, 2010).
©The China Post. All rights reserved. Reprinted by arrangement with Asia News Network.