Germany advocates peaceful Syria transition

BERLIN: Germany’s foreign minister on Wednesday urged Israel and Turkey not to jeopardise a peaceful transition in Syria after the ousting of president Bashar al-Assad in an Islamist-led rebel offensive.

“We must not allow the internal Syrian dialogue process to be torpedoed from the outside,” Annalena Baerbock told a Berlin press conference.

“Neighbours such as the Turkish and Israeli governments, which are asserting their security interests, must not jeopardise the process.” Since Assad’s downfall, Israel has launched strikes on military sites in Syria ranging from weapons depots to naval vessels, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor.

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Israel has also sent troops into a UN-patrolled buffer zone east of the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights.

Turkey meanwhile is worried Kurdish separatists could take advantage of Assad’s ouster to extend their influence in Syria, where they have dominated a large northeastern area since 2012.

Ankara sees the Kurdish forces, notably the militant group YPG, as an extension of the banned Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has fought a bloody insurgency against the Turkish state since the 1980s.

Since Assad fled, Turkish-backed groups have launched offensives in northern Syria.

The Kurdish-led force in the northeast of the country said Wednesday it had reached a US-brokered ceasefire with the Turkish-backed fighters in Manbij, an Arab-majority city that has seen fierce clashes.

Baerbock said Syria’s “new chapter” was still being written, adding that “the outcome of the revolution is not certain, nor have the people won the transition to a free and peaceful Syria”.

“We must now seek to promote positive developments in Syria and prevent negative influences,” she said. “In very specific terms, this means that a Syrian-led dialogue process is needed, which we as Europeans and as Germans will support.”

“Syria must not be allowed to become a pawn in the hands of foreign powers or forces again,” she added.

During Assad’s rule, Syria was a key ally of Iran. Assad was also backed by Russia, and Moscow’s intervention in Syria in 2015 turned the tide of the country’s civil war and is credited with saving his regime.