Syria Says It Supports the Fight Against ISIL

The Assad regime may not get notification from the United States or its coalition allies as they strike Islamic State targets in Syria, but that appears to be OK with Syria’s foreign minister.

“The Syrian Arab Republic reiterates that it stands with any international effort aimed at fighting and combating terrorism,” Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem said before the annual United Nations General Assembly in New York. But, he cautioned that Syria’s acquiescence to the coalition’s air campaign against ISIL will remain in place so long as the strikes are carried out “in full respect of the lives of innocent civilians and within the frame of full respect of national sovereignty, and in conformity with international conventions.”

Though al-Moualem said “it is true that to arrive late is better than never,” it wasn’t all praise for the coalition air campaign, and he warned that it could just make things worse. “Fighting terrorism is achievable through actual implementation of resolutions, and it is certainly possible through military strikes … [but] striking terrorism militarily while some states are continuing their support of terrorist groups, this will create a whirlpool of which the international community will not exit in decades.”

He said the recently passed U.N. Security Council Resolution 2170—which condemns human rights abuses by extremists in Iraq and Syria—is proof that Obama’s plan to train moderate elements of the Syrian opposition is a “double-standard policy” in the eyes of the Assad regime.

“Since its adoption, we have not seen any serious move to implement this resolution,” al-Moualem said. “What we see on the part of the U.S. administration is a double-standard policy and alliances to score certain political agendas, particularly through supporting with money, weapons and training of groups they call moderate. This is a real recipe for the increase of violence and terrorism, shedding of Syrian blood, prolonging of the Syrian crisis and demolishing of the political solution at its basis.”

He also expressed concern that any upcoming U.N.-backed peace talks between the Assad regime and any opposition groups might bring “Western masters” to the negotiating table. Future talks, he said, must respect “the will of the Syrian people,” citing the recent re-election of President Bashar al-Assad in a vote the international community widely dismissed.

Last week, the Turkish government put the number of Syrian refugees who have fled into Turkey at more than 1.6 million. In August, a report from the U.N. identified more than 191,000 Syrians who have been killed in the civil war in the past three and a half years.