The Silver Lining so Far at Montreaux

Based on the reporting from "the paper of record" one of the most noteworthy things that happened at yesterday's peace conference in Montreaux was that Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem spoke for longer than he should have in making his opening statements. The gist of the story by Michael Gordon and Anne Barnard is don't expect much from the ongoing negotiations:

By the end of the day, the sense that the new peace talks were headed for trouble was compounded when the proceedings ended without any hint of progress toward imposing local cease-fires or opening humanitarian corridors for the delivery of food and medicine to besieged towns and cities.

The role of the Western media in the Syrian conflict is to make sure the script stays focused on the brutality of the Assad regime as well as the fiction that the opposition actually represents Syrians inside Syria (rather than foreign intelligence agencies).

On the first point, there is another big story today about the Qatari-funded dossier of alleged Assad regime murder and torture, pictures of which were smuggled out of the country by an anonymous policeman, code named Caesar. Two things about this piece by Mark Landler and Ben Hubbard, "State Dept. Learned in November of Photos Said to Show Torture in Syria": 1) Even while promoting the report, significant questions about its reliability are raised:

The report on the photos, though led by three experts with experience in international war crimes trials, also raised some questions. While saying that the full archive consists of about 55,000 photographs, indicating the execution of around 11,000 people, the investigators acknowledged they had examined only 5,500 photos showing 835 individuals. 

The timing of the report’s release also suggested that it had been timed to undermine Mr. Assad’s government as talks began. The report says investigators interviewed the photographer, Caesar, on Jan. 12, 13, and 18, meaning the report was prepared within days of the last interview. 

One of the investigators said the timing of the report’s release had no bearing on the credibility of its findings. 

“Whether it was a month ago or a month from now, this is clear and convincing evidence of an industrial killing machine that is indicative of what Assad is doing in this civil war,” said David M. Crane, who previously indicted President Charles G. Taylor of Liberia. 

Much also remains unclear about how the photos made it out of Syria and what will be done with them now. Mr. Rashid, whose group helped smuggle them out, said it had worked for months with contacts in Syria and in unnamed “neighboring countries” to get the defector and his photos out of Syria. 

Mr. Crane played down the role of Qatar, which commissioned the report, and denied that the release of the report before the conference was political. 

“That report is to serve the rights of the victims, but we see this as a legal, humanitarian document,” he said. “It is not political at all.”

And 2), as can be seen in the passage above, the main advocate for the code name Caesar report is David Crane, who is always described as being someone who prosecuted Charles Taylor at The Hague. But what is never mentioned is his long service in the United States Government in prestigious positions such as Director of the Office of Intelligence Review and assistant general counsel of the Defense Intelligence Agency. It is hard to believe that this omission is just lazy journalism.

But a silver lining for the Syrian government in the last 48 hours is the success it has had in asking the question that concludes the report from Montreaux by Gordon and Barnard:

In an interview, Fayssal Mekdad, the Syrian deputy foreign minister, said he welcomed sitting face to face with the government’s opponents. “We look forward to looking them in the eye,” he said, “and asking them, ‘Who do you represent?’ ”

This question -- "Who does the opposition really represent?" -- was also raised, and I think quite effectively, by al-Assad himself in his interview with Agence France Presse:

AFP: The opposition that will participate in Geneva is divided and many factions on the ground don't believe it represents them. If an agreement is reached, how can it be implemented on the ground? 

President Assad: This is the same question that we are asking as a government: when I negotiate, who am I negotiating with? There are expected to be many sides at Geneva, we don't know yet who will come, but there will be various parties, including the Syrian government. It is clear to everyone that some of the groups, which might attend the conference, didn't exist until very recently; in fact they were created during the crisis by foreign intelligence agencies whether in Qatar, Saudi Arabia, France, the United States or other countries. So when we sit down with these groups, we are in fact negotiating with those countries. So, is it logical that France should be a part of the Syrian solution? Or Qatar, or America, or Saudi Arabia, or Turkey? This doesn't make any sense. Therefore, when we negotiate with these parties, we're in fact negotiating with the countries that are behind them and that support terrorism in Syria. There are other opposition forces in Syria that have a national agenda; these are parties that we can negotiate with. On the issue of the vision for Syria's future, we are open for these parties to participate in governing the Syrian state, in the government and in other institutions. But as I mentioned earlier, anything that is agreed with any party, whether in Geneva or in Syria, must be subject to people's endorsement, through a referendum put to Syrian citizens.

***

AFP: Are you prepared to have a prime minister from the opposition in a future government? 

President Assad: That depends on who this opposition represents. When it represents a majority, let’s say in parliament, naturally it should lead the government. But to appoint a prime minister from the opposition without having a majority doesn’t make any political sense in any country in the world. In your country, for example, or in Britain or elsewhere, you can’t have a prime minister from a parliamentary minority. This will all depend on the next elections, which we discussed in the Syrian initiative; they will reveal the real size of support for the various opposition forces. As to participation as a principle, we support it, of course it is a good thing.

AFP: Are you prepared to have, for example, Ahmed Jarba or Moaz Khatib, be your next prime minister? 

President Assad: This takes us back to the previous question. Do any of these people represent the Syrian people, or even a portion of the Syrian people? Do they even represent themselves, or are they just representatives of the states that created them? This brings us back to what I mentioned earlier: every one of these groups represents the country that created them. The participation of each of these individuals means the participation of each of those states in the Syrian government! This is the first point. Second, let’s assume that we agreed to the participation of these individuals in the government. Do you think that they would dare to come to Syria to take part in the government? Of course they wouldn’t. Last year, they claimed that they had control of 70% of Syria, yet they didn’t even dare to come to the areas that they had supposed control of. They did come to the border for a 30-minute photo opportunity and then they fled. How can they be ministers in the government? Can a foreigner become a Syrian minister? That’s why these propositions are totally unrealistic, but they do make a good joke!