France Says Syrian Rebels Need Aid to Fend Off ‘Chaos’
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PARIS — France’s foreign minister warned countries supporting the Syrian opposition on Monday that unless they honored their pledges of aid, the control of Syria could fall to militant Islamist groups. “Facing the collapse of a state and society, it is Islamist groups that risk gaining ground if we do not act as we should,” said the minister, Laurent Fabius. “We cannot let a revolution that started as a peaceful and democratic protest degenerate into a conflict of militias.” His comments seemed as much an analysis of the current bloody chaos in Syria as a warning about the future. “Chaos is not tomorrow, it is today, and we need to end it,” Mr. Fabius said. “We need to end it in a peaceful way, and that means increased and concrete support to the Syrian National Coalition.” He was addressing the Friends of Syria group of more than 50 countries, including the United States, that support the official Syrian opposition, the National Coalition of Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces. He spoke two days before a donor conference in Kuwait sponsored by the United Nations, which aims to raise $1.5 billion for the two million Syrians displaced in Syria and the more than 600,000 who have fled across its borders. Separately, Israel warned on Monday that the Syrian government’s control of its stockpiles of chemical weapons was precarious, adding a sense of urgency to fears that the weapons could fall into the hands of the Lebanese Hezbollah or Islamist extremists, and fueling speculation in Israel about military options. Amos Gilad, a senior Israeli defense official, told Army Radio that while the chemical stockpiles were still under the control of the government, it “does not control large parts of Syria.” Daniel B. Shapiro, the United States ambassador to Israel, told Israeli Radio: “There are two dangerous possibilities. Either the regime will use chemical weapons against the Syrian people, or chemical weapons will be transferred to Hezbollah or other extremist organizations. We want to prevent both possibilities from happening. “We are monitoring the situation closely. We share intelligence with each other and we continue to coordinate.” Adding to the sense of heightened alert in Israel were reports of feverish security consultations in recent days between Israel’s political and security chiefs and the deployment of at least one Iron Dome antirocket missile defense battery in northern Israel. At the Friends of Syria meeting here in Paris, Mr. Fabius stressed that the longer the civil war continued, the greater the likelihood of an ascent by Islamist militants. “If we don’t give the means to the Syrian people to go achieve their freedom, there is a risk, and we all know it exists, that massacres and antagonisms amplify, and that extremism and terrorism prevail,” he said, suggesting that the credibility of the opposition coalition, formed in November, was at stake if it could not create a unified front and a transitional government, something it failed to do last week. At the same time, frustration and resentment are building in the Syrian opposition over a lack of international support, particularly at a time when French troops are battling Islamic militants in Mali with African, British and American support. A Syrian journalist, Tah al-Rahbi, posted an angry message on Facebook listing all the help Mali was getting from the West and comparing the situation there with Syria’s. “All this orgy” of help for Mali, Mr. Rahbi wrote, “whereas more than one million Syrian refugees in Lebanon, Turkey and Jordan don’t have access to the most basic needs... and more than 70,000 martyrs... and 200,000 detained... and 50,000 missing.” The opposition coalition’s three vice presidents were at the Friends of Syria meeting. One, Riad Seif, complained that numerous pledges of financial aid had gone unfulfilled. “From the beginning we said we should be based in Syria, but so far we haven’t received any money to run a government,” Mr. Seif said. “We need an interim or transitional government to provide assistance to millions of Syrians in liberated zones and to help bring the collapse of the regime” of President Bashar al-Assad. George Sabra, another vice president, said that the coalition needed at least $500 million urgently to start a credible government. And he repeated a request for weapons aid. The coalition has been recognized as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people, but its failure to form a transitional government makes it difficult for Western states to provide it more sweeping formal recognition or significant military aid. Arms are coming from Persian Gulf states like Qatar, however. Similar shipments to rebels in Libya ended up in the hands of Islamic militants, raising American fears of a repeat in Syria. Some of the most organized fighters battling government troops in the conflict, which has lasted nearly two years and caused the deaths of an estimated 60,000 people, are Islamists drawn from outside Syria to fight what they consider a global jihad. There is also considerable concern that the revolt is becoming more marked by sectarian divisions, with Sunni fighters trying to overthrow a government dominated by the Alawites, a minority group that is an offshoot of Shiism. Syria’s minority Christians also fear the Islamists, and many of them have quietly supported Mr. Assad, fearing a further blood bath should he fall. In Syria, representatives of the Local Coordination Committees, an antigovernment network, said that rebels had taken control of the Haran al-Awameed checkpoint at the fence surrounding the Damascus airport and had hit the airport with mortars. Rebels and government forces have been contesting the approaches to the airport for nearly two months, disrupting civilian airline service in a symbolic blow against the government and prompting Syrians who can afford it to fly out of Beirut instead. Also on Monday, the Nusra Front, an Islamist group allied with Al Qaeda in Iraq that Washington has declared a terrorist organization, posted a statement online taking responsibility for a bombing a week ago at the headquarters of a pro-government militia in Salamiya, in Hama Province. The group said at least 42 people were killed. The government did not specify a death toll in the bombing, but the state-run SANA news agency published photographs of what it said was a funeral procession last Wednesday for the victims. In one photo, a dozen men are seen standing behind 11 coffins, each coffin wrapped in a Syrian flag. <NYT_AUTHOR_ID> <p>Isabel Kershner contributed reporting from Jerusalem, and Anne Barnard and Hania Mourtada from Beirut, Lebanon. |