Targeting civilians not in Damascus interest: Syrian leader
Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad has dismissed as untrue accusations that government forces target hospitals and civilian infrastructure in the war-torn country, saying such actions run contrary to Damascus’ interests.
Assad made the remarks in an interview with Denmark’s TV2 station, whose excerpts were released on Thursday.
Some opposition groups and relief agencies have recently claimed that Syrian and Russian jets have been hitting civilian sites in the contested northwestern city of Aleppo, which has been divided since 2012 between government forces in the west and foreign-sponsored militants in the east.
Over the past few months, Syria’s second largest city has witnessed intense fighting and turned into a frontline battleground.
“To say that this is our aim as a government, (that) we give the orders to destroy hospitals or schools or to kill civilians, this is against our interest,” Assad said, noting, however, that mistakes are sometimes committed by individuals in any war.
The Syrian president further underlined that if the accusations of “committing … atrocities” were true, he could not have remained in office.
Elsewhere in his comments, Assad said that Europe is now absent from the international political scene as it is following in Washington’s footsteps, adding that some European countries even “do not dare to take their own independent path in politics.”
In another development on Thursday, United Nations Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura called on members of the Jabhat Fateh al-Sham terrorist group, al-Qaeda’s Syrian branch formerly known as al-Nusra Front, to leave Aleppo so that civilians could access relief.
The UN envoy told a news conference in the Swiss city of Geneva that if the terrorists lay down their weapons “in dignity” and leave Aleppo, he would “personally” accompany them out.
Meanwhile, Russia voiced support for De Mistura’s proposal for escorting the terrorists out of Aleppo.
TASS news agency quoted Mikhail Bogdanov, a Russian presidential envoy for the Middle East and Africa, as saying, "It's high time" referring to the UN envoy's plea.
The developments came one day after the Syrian military announced a decision to scale back its attacks against foreign-backed Takfiri terrorists in Aleppo in a bid to allow safe passage for civilians out of the city.
SS
