Samira al-Musalama, a Syrian oppositions figure, revealed in an article published by the UK-based al-Hayat newspaper on December 8 that Haytham Manna chairman of the Syrian opposition Qamh Movement and Khaled Mahameed (a member of the Syrian opposition High Negotiations Committee) wants Farouk al-Sharaa, a prominent figure of the ruling Ba’ath party, to head the upcoming the Syrian National Dialogue Conference in Russia’s city of Sochi.
According to al-Musalama’s article, Manna and Mahameed proposed their idea to Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov and Sergey Vershinin, special envoy of the Russian Foreign Minister for Middle East settlement, during a meeting in Moscow in November.
Al-Musalama said that al-Shara’a was chosen by the Syrian opposition because he is a “moderate” figure that’s accepted by all Syrian sides because he didn’t take any positions during the Syrian crisis. However, unlike what the Syrian opposition is claiming, al-Shara’a is one of “the old guards of the Ba’ath party”, a term used to refer to the Syrian leaders who raised to power along with former Syrian President Hafez al-Assad.
Al-Shara’a is will know for being very close to the al-Assad family and highly trusted by them. He was appointed as the Syrian foreign minister by Hafez al-Assad in 1984 and occupied this position until 2006 when he was appointed as the vice president of Syria by the current Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad.
Unlike what the Syrian opposition is promoting, the naming of al-Shara’a as the possible head of the upcoming Sochi conference may be a gain for the Damascus government.
Surely the opposition is aware of this? I could be wrong, but what I think this means that the opposition which is presenting this idea, is the real moderate opposition and not the US backed “takfiri opposition”. There is an important difference between the two, since the takfiri opposition has no future in any process. Apparently the moderate opposition thinks that the Ba’ath old guard has an important role for the future.
No, Dont be fooled! They try to replace Asssad with him!
Dont call Assad an “Ass sad” again.
Can happen nobody is perfect!
Or it could be a childish attempt to a psychological game. By choosing a close Assad ally, perhaps they thought they can make Assad suspicious about him and “liquidate” him, and removing one of “opposition”‘s powerful adversaries. Sometimes if you repeat something enough, you’ll believe it yourself. They repeated “Assad is a monster” and now they believed it themselves.
They’ll say: ‘Assad must go, let us have al-Shara’a.’. That’s not that hard to predict. Then it depends on what al-Shara’a says. He might just say ‘Assad must go.’, you don’t get to be vice president of Syria without being a sneaky sob.
Maybe it was his plan all along!
It would have been a good play 1-2 years ago. Now Assad controls 80-90% of the population and really doesn’t need to talk with the opposition anymore.
Heh, they are trying to strengthen the vice president in the hopes that there will be a power struggle!
Trying to drive wedge in between Assad and his closest key figures. Divide and conquer. After this trick, in which Russia was jumping right into the trap, Assad must go!