Syria agrees to Arab observer mission, at last

DAMASCUS, Monday

Foreign Minister Walid Muallem pledged Syria’s full cooperation with Arab observers on Monday after his government finally agreed to allow a mission in to monitor a deal to end nine months of bloodshed.

The deal, signed at Arab League headquarters in Cairo after weeks of prevarication that had prompted the bloc to adopt sanctions, will last for an initial period of a month, renewable with the agreement of both sides, Muallem said.

He said the deal would not impinge on Syria’s sovereignty after the Arab League agreed to 70 per cent of the changes sought by Damascus.

“Signing the protocol is the start of cooperation with the Arab League and we will welcome the observers’ mission from the Arab League,” Muallem told a Damascus news conference minutes after the deal was inked.

The Arab League said an advance team would head to Syria within 72 hours, but France, which has spearheaded international pressure on the regime to end its deadly crackdown, said the observers could not be in place quickly enough.

“We regret there have been 30 more deaths in the past two days. It’s urgent,” a French foreign ministry spokesman said.

Muallem said Damascus fully expected the observer mission to vindicate its contention that the unrest rocking the country since March was the work of armed rebels, not peaceful protesters as maintained by Western governments and human rights watchdogs.

“There are many countries in the world who don’t wish to admit the presence of terrorist armed groups in Syria.” he said.

“They will come and see that they are present... We must not be afraid at all.” Muallem said that Syria would also allow in foreign media, provided they reported objectively.

“On principle we will allow media to enter as long as they carry out their work in an objective manner,” he said. “If the aim is to carry out distorted interviews, I will not accept it.”

He said Syria’s Cold War ally Russia, which in October used its Security Council veto to block a resolution that would have threatened “targeted measures” against regime figures, had backed the observer mission.