“We haven’t achieved anything. In Homs, we haven’t been able to do anything. About prisoners, disappeared people, kidnapped people…we haven’t achieved anything.”
Thus spoke U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi over the weekend to the Munich Security Conference on the Geneva II Conference on Syria. After nearly ten days of deliberations peppered by sweeping pronouncements and heated accusations, the Geneva II Conference on Syria concluded January 31 with no action. For Syrians now entering the fourth year of a tragic and painful civil war, hope may have perished in Geneva.
At the previous such meeting in June 2012, participants agreed that there should be “…a transitional government body with full executive powers” in Syria. That government might include members of the current Syrian regime as well as the opposition. This was endorsed by the UN Security Council. The U.S. and other governments, though obviously not Syria or Russia, also declared that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad could not be a part of a transitional government.
But much has changed since the June 2012 meeting. Momentum has shifted and Assad no longer faces the “imminent departure” predicted in early 2013. His opposition has fragmented, with hundreds of groups now declaring resistance to his regime. The conflict is increasingly sectarian, i.e., Sunni versus Alawite/Shia, and has attracted the direct involvement of outside fighters such as al-Qaeda, Sunni jihadis, Hezbollah, and Iraqi Shia militias.
Most tragically, the conflict has racked up casualty and refugee figures rivaling those of the 2003-2011 Iraq war. Per media and UN reports, some 130,000 Syrians have perished since the conflict began in early 2011. By contrast, the eight-year Iraq war claimed 157,000 Iraqi lives, according to the Iraq Body Count. Worth noting, there were about 95,000 Iraqi fatalities in the first three years of that conflict.
Some nine million Syrians, or about 40% of the population, are displaced, including 2.3 million refugees. At its height in the summer of 2007, the Iraq war had produced over 4.2 million displaced Iraqis, two million inside Iraq and 2.2 million in neighboring countries, according to UNHCR.
At Geneva II, the Assad regime did not fare as well as it had hoped in that it was unable to focus the participants on what it terms “combatting terror,” i.e., just about any action opposing the regime. The opposition, which hardly represented the wide range of opposition groups fighting the regime in Syria, may have presented itself better than expected. Nevertheless, it failed to achieve progress in any priority area. Here is the report card:
Disposition of Assad: Regime – C; Syria – F: The first outcome many looked for in Geneva is what would happen to Assad. Not surprisingly, there was no agreement. The Syrian opposition (represented by the Syrian National Coalition), the U.S., and other members of the London 11 (the group of western and Arab governments opposing Assad) continued to insist that Assad could not be a part of any transitional government. However, Assad finds himself less threatened now than at any point in the civil war. So, it is unsurprising the participants failed to agree on his removal. Elections, unlikely to be internationally supervised, are scheduled later this year and it appears Assad will run.
Establishment of transitional government: Regime – C; Syria – D. The regime presented itself as willing to accept the transitional government, knowing that failure to agree on implementation steps rendered the point moot. The only hope for Syria is that the much-discussed transitional government is not dead. But conferees failed to make concrete progress, i.e.: no sign of practical, genuine steps to set it up; no process for choosing its composition or criteria for participation; no agreement on a transitional parliament to, among other things, draft a new constitution; and, of course, no consensus on a vetting process to keep those accused of gross human rights abuses out of the transitional government.
Sectarian violence: Regime – F; Syria – F: Addressing sectarian violence should have been a sine qua non in Geneva. Syria’s sectarian violence is spreading to Iraq and Lebanon. The regime sought unsuccessfully to divert all discussion of the opposition to “defeating terrorism.” For Syrians, no action means: a sentence to more violence; destruction of Syria’s national integrity; and possible emergence of warlord-run, Somalia-like fiefdoms in the heart of the Middle East. For the region, it means greater instability from extremism. For the regime, survival is its strategy, thereby making it the least bad option.
Humanitarian crisis: Regime – F; Syria – F: This was the one area where conferees needed to find common ground. But for Assad, failure to effectively address this issue means that he and his regime bear greater responsibility. For Syrians, it means further suffering and doubtless loss of hope. Also left dissatisfied are nearby countries, UN organizations, and international NGOs overwhelmed by demands on them.
Accountability: Regime – F; Syria – F: There is no accountability. The international community still holds no one genuinely accountable for atrocities against civilians, especially women and children, though there were plenty of accusations leveled in Geneva. Members of the Assad regime and opposition groups responsible for atrocities against Syrians remain at-large. For Syrians, the number and frequency of such crimes will continue. Continuing to blame, but failing to act on this matter will invite more abuses, casualties, and incidents of torture and disappearance. And in that, the international community – especially Russia, Iran, and China – merit a failing grade as well.
Realistically, there never really was hope for agreement on these matters going into Geneva. For the U.S. and other major nations championing the transition government and Assad’s removal, Geneva II is a call – from the Syrian people, a desperate cry, really – for a serious reappraisal of their policies.
Continuing such talks, deadlocked in failure, seems futile now. Absent significantly greater pressure on Assad and the regime, including military force, no change in the plight of Syria is likely in the foreseeable future. Assad, feeling less and less threatened, sees no reason to back away, and nor do his supporters.
Without some incentive for Assad to negotiate seriously, many more Syrians will conclude that Assad is the least bad option, as already seems the case from media reporting and anecdotal personal accounts coming from the country. For them, the current situation – the chaos, violence, human tragedy, and devastation of a nation – is not sustainable.