Sunday, June 4, 2023
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Damascus
Sunday, June 4, 2023

Opinion | US administrations are killing Syrians by abstention

Credit: Andrew CABALLERO-REYNOLDS/AFP

When the US defined terrorism, it deliberately ignored Assad regime’s terrorism, prison murders, crimes against civilians, and brutally targeting cities, even with chemical weapons, allowing war crimes to be committed on a large scale while its forces were on the Syrian soil and in the Syrian skies.

When former President Barack Obama declared that chemical weapons are a red line, this logically entailed that the rest of the weapons were allowed, as what was forbidden was the type of weapon and not the commission of the crime. This is still the case until today.

After the Assad regime repeated its use of the chemical weapon against civilians despite the warning, the US forced it to hand over its chemical weapons, not to stop its crimes against the people.

the US has never activated resolution 2118 as its implementation is done by member states, and does not require a return to the UN Security Council

Kamal Al Labwani

Resolution 2118 was issued in 2013, and the regime violated it dozens of times and the international investigation committees proved these violations. It even continued to produce and develop that weapon and used it in a number of places such as Latamna, in addition to sending some of it to organizations classified by the US as terrorist ones like Hezbollah.

Still, the US has never activated Resolution 2118 as its implementation is done by member states, and does not require a return to the UN Security Council or to a second resolution, because the United Nations is not an executive authority.

The American Congress endorsed the Caesar Act, but it remained almost ink on paper

Kamal Al Labwani

After the Russian invasion of Syria, Resolution 2254 was issued in 2015, which insists on the immediate release of detainees, and the imposition of a transitional authority if it is not agreed upon within 18 months. But after seven years, it is still stagnating, and the regime denied the existence of detainees after killing most of them. Still, the Security Council and the influential countries in it, led by the US, affirm their confidence and support for the efforts of the international envoy who cannot even bring together the parties, and who endorsed Syrian personalities not elected by the people but chosen by Turkey and Russia, being the two major powers on the ground, to write a constitution for the afflicted Syrian people, flouting the most basic principles of self-determination recognized by the United Nations itself whose delegate is in clear violation of its law.

The Caesar photos that depicted the fate of the detainees embarrassed the US administration so it decided after years of hesitation to impose sanctions on the regime. The American Congress endorsed the Caesar Act, but it remained almost ink on paper. And when you ask an American diplomat why America is doing nothing, he/she simply says that there is no American policy towards Syria, even though its army occupies a large area of it and supports militias that control important oil and agricultural wealth.

not doing anything while one can amounts to a crime as the result is the massacre of a people

Kamal Al Labwani

In fact, most of the times the US-adopted policy towards Syria is to do nothing. Not doing anything is a policy in itself. Legally, not doing anything while one can amounts to a crime as the result is the massacre of a people, especially with the US present on the ground, not to prevent crimes but for its own interests. 

Kamal Al Labwani
Kamal Al Labwani
Syrian writer and political opposition figure

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