When is a deal not a deal? It is an urgent question for John Kerry, the well-meaning but under-powered US secretary of state, and his Russian counterpart, the inscrutable veteran diplomat Sergei Lavrov. Their agreement, reached in Munich last week, on a “cessation of hostilities” in Syria’s civil war, was initially hailed as a breakthrough. It appeared to presage the beginning of the end of a calamitous conflict which, by latest estimates, has cost the lives of 470,000 people and displaced nearly half the population since 2011.
This is heartening news. Except closer scrutiny reveals the Kerry-Lavrov pact is as shot full of holes as an Aleppo apartment building. It is not a ceasefire, in the usual sense of the word, since it does not apply to all parties involved. It is temporary; Kerry said it was best described as a “pause”. The cessation may begin within the next week, or it may not. This depends on the attitude of key actors not present in Munich, namely the regime of Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, and the western and Arab-backed Sunni Muslim rebel groups.
It can be safely assumed Islamic State terrorists, specifically excluded from the deal, will do their best to derail it. Peace is not on their agenda. The position of the al-Qaida-linked al-Nusra Front, also excluded, is more nuanced. If left alone, they could conceivably join Assad’s more moderate opponents in upholding a truce, if only to gain time to regroup and outflank Isis. Yet whichever way they jump, all the principal parties agree on one point: a deal that so far exists on paper will succeed only if it is honoured on the ground. So who will go first?
Not Assad. Once again justifying his reputation as a strategic numbskull, he vowed instead to reconquer the entire country, an aim the US rightly called deluded. Not the rebels. They continue to insist Assad must first somehow be removed from power, something they have signally failed to achieve in nearly five years of fighting. And, crucially, not the Russians, either. The biggest hole in the Munich pact is the failure to secure a halt to Moscow’s indiscriminate aerial bombing. In the north, around Aleppo, Russia is targeting western-backed rebels and the Turkmen minority, whom it calls terrorists. Isis, the real terrorists, are left largely untouched. It remains wholly unclear if and when Russian bombing will stop.
If Russian policy were directed by a more enlightened, or even a vaguely normal, leadership – meaning one that broadly observes international law, UN treaties and human rights norms – then there might be scope for optimism. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Vladimir Putin, Russia’s rogue president, is pursuing his own malevolent, neo-colonialist agenda in Syria. His priority is the survival of the Assad regime, his long-time client and main Middle Eastern ally, no matter the cost in blood and human suffering. His larger objective is to reduce US regional influence and, if possible, weaken and divide the EU and Nato. Deeply imperfect though this still elusive truce undoubtedly is, it is vital that it is not allowed to collapse, and that it is used instead as a foundation block for something more permanent. As western leaders have belatedly realised, the stakes are incredibly high.Syria’s war began as a localised, peaceful protest against Assad’s unthinking repression. It has spiralled into the biggest crisis of our time – both political and humanitarian – and a watershed test for the international community. Thanks to Assad, the future cohesion of the EU is increasingly in doubt as it struggles, so far unsuccessfully, to deal with uncontrolled mass migration. Thanks to Assad, Turkey, a key western ally squeezed on all sides, is close to implosion. Thanks to Assad, in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf the talk is of military intervention in support of Sunni brothers, an eventuality that would certainly bring a dangerous riposte from Shia Iran.
In Washington, meanwhile, the credibility of American global leadership is at an all-time low as Barack Obama looks for an easy way out next January and Donald Trump, a third-rate Republican presidential wannabe, flaunts his worldly ignorance and prejudice to hysterical applause from a gallery of fools.
For all these reasons, it is vital that Britain, experienced in the complexities of the Middle East, does all in its power to bolster the UN’s drive for immediate, full humanitarian access to Syria’s besieged towns and cities, a lasting ceasefire, and a re-launching of the Geneva talks.
It is no use Philip Hammond and Michael Fallon, the foreign and defence secretaries, bemoaning Russian double-dealing. That is nothing new. Now is the time to apply the screws to Putin’s Kremlin, in every possible way, to ensure he and his puppet Assad give peace a chance.
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