Bashar al-Assad’s uncle calls for him to step down

Reuters, PARIS and AMMAN





Syrian President Bashar al-Assad must step down quickly to stop the country spiraling into civil war, but should be allowed to stay in the country as he is not responsible for the unrest, the incumbent leader’s uncle, Rifaat al-Assad, said on Thursday.

In an interview with French television, Rifaat al-Assad said months of civil unrest had effectively deprived Syria of leadership and it now risked being torn apart by armed militias and could face a worse upheaval than neighboring Lebanon’s civil war in the 1970s and 1980s.

Out of a sense of patriotism, Bashar al-Assad should speed up his departure, he said, but his presence in Syria was not untenable, as blood had been shed on both sides, among supporters and opponents of the government.

Syrians living in Jordan shout slogans against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad at a demonstration in front of the Syrian embassy in Amman on Thursday. Photo: Reuters

“He has to go, but without leaving the country. He isn’t responsible; it’s a historical accumulation of many things and I’d like him to convince himself to step down,” Rifaat al-Assad told LCI television.

Rifaat al-Assad is a former military commander, widely held responsible for crushing an Islamist uprising in 1982 against then president Hafez al-Assad, Bashar’s father, in which thousands were killed.

Rifaat turned against the government in the 1980s and now lives in exile. Earlier this year, his son and Bashar’s cousin, Ribal, who lives in exile in London, urged the Syrian leader to attempt a rapprochement with opponents to avoid civil war.

On Thursday, Ribal told BBC radio the Syrian government just wanted to cling to power.

He called for the opposition to be united, to include all the country’s different ethnic groups, sects and religions, as part of a process towards a peaceful transition. This could allow his cousin to “get out, if somebody could give him refuge,” he said.

“I have been talking to people in the military and in the military secret service lately in Syria who also are tired and are against what is happening,” he said.

Meanwhile, in Syria, government troops shelled two northern villages overnight after an attack by army defectors on forces loyal to Bashar al-Assad, local activists said yesterday, in the first reported use of sustained shelling against the eight-month uprising.

The assault came a day after the Arab League suspended Syria and gave it until the end of the week to comply with an Arab peace plan to end a crackdown on the revolt that has killed more than 3,500 people, by a UN count.

Eight villagers were injured overnight when tank shells and heavy mortars fell for three hours on Tal Minnij and Maarshamsheh and surrounding farmland, the activists said.

It was not possible to confirm the shelling independently. Syria has barred most foreign media since unrest began.

Army defectors earlier had attacked a building housing security forces near army depots in the Wadi al-Deif area on the edge of the town of Maarat al-Numaan, 290km north of Damascus, activists said.