DAMASCUS, Syria – Syria’s foreign minister accused Arab states on Monday of conspiring against Damascus after the Arab League voted to suspend Syria’s membership over the government’s deadly crackdown on an eight month-old uprising.
Walid al-Moallem said Saturday’s near-unanimous vote at the Arab League’s headquarters in Cairo was «shameful and malicious,» betraying his country’s deep alarm over the decision.
The vote was a stinging rebuke to a regime that prides itself as a bastion of Arab nationalism and left Syria increasingly isolated over a crackdown that the U.N. estimates has killed more than 3,500 people since mid-March.
«We wanted the role of the Arab League to be a supporting role but if the Arabs wanted to be conspirators, this is their business,» he told a press conference in Damascus.
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The vote to suspend Syria put Damascus in direct confrontation with other Arab powers, including Qatar and Saudi Arabia, who were pushing for the suspension. The vote constituted a major boost for the Syrian opposition.
The unified Arab position also puts more pressure on the U.N. Security Council to impose sanctions, despite objections by Syrian allies Russia and China. Only Syria, Lebanon and Yemen voted against the Arab League suspension of Syria, with Iraq abstaining.
An Arab League decision had paved the way for the U.N.-mandated no-fly zone and NATO air strikes that eventually brought down Libya’s Muammar Qaddafi, but the group has stressed international intervention was not on the agenda in Syria.
Still, al-Moallem played on fears that the diplomatic campaign could escalate to Libya-style military action, saying Syria’s army is far stronger than Libya’s.
«They know that our valiant army has capabilities that they might not be able to tolerate if they are used,» he said.
CBS News’ George Baghdadi says al-Moallem insisted the country’s isolation would be over come, 고흥출장만남 as «we have alternative cards to play.»
«The solution is Syrian, and you will see that in the coming days,» said the foreign minister, without giving any further explanation on what Damascus would do to head off the ongoing strain.
Syrian President Bashar Assad asserts that extremists pushing a foreign agenda to destabilize Syria are behind the country’s unrest, rather than true reform-seekers aiming to open the country’s autocratic political system.
