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Europe Conflicted on Whether to Arm Syrian Insurgents Other Europeans Balk at Bid by Britain and France to Arm Syria’s Rebels
(about 3 hours later)
BRUSSELS — A push by France and Britain to end a weapons embargo on Syria to allow the arming of rebels there ran into heavy resistance on Friday from other European countries, which worry that such a step will only escalate the Syrian conflict and stoke instability elsewhere in the Middle East. BRUSSELS — As the Syrian crisis entered its third year on Friday, the top rebel military leader declared that the opposition would “never give up” and asked for more support, even as a push by France and Britain to arm the outgunned rebels drew heavy resistance from other European countries.
At a European Union summit meeting here in Brussels, a number of European leaders, including Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, and the bloc’s foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, expressed doubt about the wisdom of lifting the arms embargo. The division highlighted the difficulties Europe has in speaking with a single voice on international issues, particularly those that risk entangling Europe in foreign military conflicts. Germany, Austria and other countries pushed back hard against a Franco-British effort to lift an arms embargo on Syria to allow the arming of the rebels — who say they desperately need antiaircraft and other sophisticated weapons to turn the tide of a war that has killed more than 70,000 people.
France and Britain, former imperial powers with a long tradition of intervening overseas, take a far more activist approach to foreign affairs than other European nations, particularly Germany and Austria, which have sought for decades to shed any hints of militarism left over from World War II. After a two-day European Union summit meeting in Brussels, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany told reporters she worried such a step would “just fan the flames of conflict.”
“We have a number of reservations regarding arms exports even to the opposition because one has to ask oneself whether that won’t just fan the flames of conflict,” Ms. Merkel told a news conference at the end of the two-day summit. She said European foreign ministers would discuss the matter further, starting next week at a meeting in Ireland, in an effort to find a common position. Gen. Salim Idriss, the leader of the Free Syrian Army, sought Friday to rebut some key arguments marshaled against arming the rebels — fears of sectarian conflict and extremist Islamist influence — by declaring that the rebels welcomed all Syrians into their fold, including members of President Bashar al-Assad’s Alawite sect.
President François Hollande of France, who led a Franco-British push in Brussels to allow arms deliveries to opponents of the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, stressed that Paris would keep up the pressure for a change of policy by the 27-nation European Union, telling reporters that “many around the table were convinced but not all.” Diplomats, however, said there was scant support for a lifting of the embargo outside London and Paris. “We, the Free Syrian Army, want freedom and democracy for all Syrians, whoever they are — Sunni or Shia, Alawi, Christians or Druze,” he said, naming Syria’s major sects in a video address posted on the Internet.
France, which in January sent troops to Mali, a former French colony, to push back an offensive by Islamist rebels, has grown increasingly frustrated at the slow pace of European decision-making on foreign affairs. The European Union expressed support for France’s Mali intervention but, months later, has been struggling to put together a training mission it promised for the Malian armed forces. But two years after Syria’s uprising started with protests over the arrests of young boys for spraying antigovernment graffiti in the southern city of Dara’a, supporters and opponents of President Assad often seem to be describing two different conflicts.
Mr. Hollande said he drew hope of a shift in the union’s policy on Syria from the fact that the bloc’s position had already “evolved” from an initial stand of not getting involved beyond providing humanitarian assistance. In February, European Union foreign ministers agreed to extend an arms embargo for a further three months but agreed to allow nonlethal but quasi-military aid like flak jackets and armored vehicles, something that Germany and others had previously opposed. Opponents blame the president for responding to peaceful protests with overwhelming force and, when the rebellion took up arms, leveling entire neighborhoods with air and artillery strikes.
Ms. Merkel on Friday left open the possibility of a further shift, saying that she had “not as yet come to a definitive position” on the question of arms supplies. She added that “nonlethal support was not something we wanted to give but there was a change.” Supporters regard the rebels as foreign-financed extremists who threaten Syria’s minorities. The influence of foreign fighters and donors has grown with the conflict and some rebel groups have turned to indiscriminate weapons like car bombs.
But, referring to a change of policy by Britain and France in favor of arms supplies to Syria, she added: “Just the fact that two have changed their position is not sufficient for 25 others to follow suit completely. But it is well worth our while to try and bring about a unified European position.” As the two sides dig in militarily across an increasingly divided country, the human toll mounts, further destabilizing the region.
She said that Ms. Ashton, the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs & Security Policy, had presented a number of reasons during the summit meeting for not supplying lethal weapons, including the risk of instability in Lebanon, the wider Middle East and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. “All this has to be weighed very carefully in the balance,” Ms. Merkel said. United Nations officials declared Friday that they had received barely one-fifth of the money needed to care for Syrian refugees for the first half of the year — the worst shortfall in recent memory — as their numbers grow at a staggering rate.
Ms. Ashton, though herself British, has distanced herself from Britain’s increasingly loud calls for military support for the Syrian opposition and stressed the need for a political solution. The British prime minister, David Cameron, who has for months demanded a more robust European policy in support of rebels, told members of Parliament in London earlier this week that if other European countries continued to block arms to Syria, Britain would be ready to act unilaterally. In December, when there were about half a million refugees outside the country, the number was expected to double by June.
Concerns among many European leaders that supporting the Syrian opposition militarily could backfire deepened early this month when rebels seized a convoy of unarmed United Nations peacekeepers in part of the disputed Golan Heights region between Syria and Israel. The rebels later released them but the incident heightened fears about the role of Islamist radicals in the faction-ridden opposition. But it surpassed one million last week — and another 126,000 refugees have been registered since.
Austria, anxious about the safety of its own peacekeepers on the Golan Heights, said Friday that it opposed lifting a European Union ban on sending arms to Syria. “One can never rule out whose hands more weapons will end up in, and that’s why I am against this suggestion,” the Austrian defense minister, Gerald Klug, told national broadcaster ORF, according to a report by Reuters news agency. “It gives us a chilly feeling down our spine,” Amin Awad, the refugee agency’s Geneva-based emergency director, said in a telephone interview, explaining that it had committed more than half its stocks for global emergency responses to its Syrian operation.
Mr. Hollande brushed aside worries that lifting the arms embargo risked inflaming the Syrian conflict and putting arms in the hands of Syrian groups opposed to the West. Noting that repeated efforts at a negotiated settlement had got nowhere and that “the number of victims only gets heavier day by day,” he said: “The biggest risk is inaction. We reduce the risk by taking action.” “This is the worst crisis in terms of funding in recent history,” he said. “We are basically living week by week.”
Yet with diplomatic efforts to reach a political solution stuck, and the world divided on whether to provide weapons to the rebels, there is no end in sight.
The United States said Friday that it would permit Americans to send money to Syrian rebel groups, modifying sanctions imposed earlier in the conflict that forbade any transactions with Syrians.
The change was bound to draw criticism from those who worry that money from the United States could end up financing movements that threaten American interests.
The divisions at the Brussels meeting highlighted Europe’s difficulties in speaking with a single voice on international issues, especially foreign military intervention. France and Britain, former imperial powers, take a far more activist approach to foreignaffairs than do Germany and Austria, which have sought for decades to shed any hints of militarism left over from World War II.
Diplomats said France and Britain were largely alone in their push to allow arms deliveries to opponents of Mr. Assad. Europe’s foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, who is British, joined Mrs. Merkel in expressing doubts about the wisdom of lifting the arms embargo.
France, which in January sent troops to Mali, a former French colony, to push back an offensive by Islamist rebels, is frustrated that months after the European Union expressed support for the operation, it has not assembled a promised training mission for the Malian armed forces.
Frances’s president, François Hollande, said he drew hope from the fact that the Europe’s position had already “evolved” from an initial refusal to provide anything but humanitarian aid to the February decision to funnel nonlethal but quasi-military aid such as flak jackets and armored vehicles.
Ms. Merkel on Friday left open the possibility of a further shift, saying that she had “not as yet come to a definitive position” on the question of arms supplies.
She said that Ms. Ashton had presented a number of cautions about supplying lethal weapons, including the risk of instability in Lebanon, the wider Middle East and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.
Prime Minister David Cameron of Britain, who has for months demanded a more robust European policy in support of the rebels, told members of Parliament in London earlier this week that if other European countries continued to block arms to Syria, Britain would be ready to act unilaterally.
United Nations officials, meanwhile, have little leverage to pressure countries that pledged $1.5 billion at a Syria donor conference in Kuwait a few months ago to make good on their promises.
Jens Laerke, a spokesman for the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, told reporters that given the almost daily headlines on Syria, “we’re a little surprised that this money is not coming forward.”

Andrew Higgins reported from Brussels, and Anne Barnard from Beirut, Lebanon. Nick Cumming-Bruce contributed reporting from Geneva, and Steven Erlanger from Brussels.