Washington offers Syrian president deal to end isolation

[maddezmom]

LONDON (AFP) - The United States has offered Syrian President Bashar al-Assad a deal to end his regime's international isolation if it agrees to a list of concessions.


The offer was described as a "Kadhafi deal" after the one clinched two years ago with Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi, whose regime was shunned after being blamed for the bombing of a passenger jet over the Scottish town of Lockerbie.

Citing senior US and Arab officials, The Times newspaper said the latest deal -- which hinges on four key demands -- could save Syria from the threat of looming international sanctions.

It said the matter could be resolved as early as next week when a UN team investigating the assassination of former Lebanese premier Rafiq Hariri is due to submit a report on its findings to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan.


more;http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20051015/wl_mideast_afp/syriausassadbritain_051015091426;_

[HuffleClaw]

1. 'deal' ? more like EXTORTION.

and right on schedule. watch 'em start up with the rhetoric too. '...not willing to be a part of the civilized world...' '...outlaw regime...'
this is sooooooooooooo predictable. and as i've said before, they NEED a distraction from their domestic woes AND someone to blame their failures in iraq on. so, when syria rightly refuses this 'list of demands', what can we then expect? i am appalled and disgusted.

[mallard]

2. Nice carrot...

.... but where's the stick?

Pre-positioning with offers they can't refuse, hopefully. If the package includes total abondonment of Syria's claim to formerly sovereign territory in the Golan they will turn it down.

[WCGreen]

3. Sounds like Cambodia and Laos to me.....

And weren't the insurgents just last week being trained in Iran....

Bait and switch....

Two country monte....

[muriel_volestrangler]

4. The demands of "stop interfering in other countries" might look better if

they came from a country that hadn't just invaded a country, killing tens of thousands, on made-up justifications. If it was Canada asking Syria to clean up its act, it would have a little more force.

[allemand]

5. Joshua Landis thinks that Bolton leaked this information in order to

torpedo the deal:

A few reporters called today to ask if I had heard anything about a purported US-Syrian deal. Their editors wanted them to get the story. Evidently Mr. B. - yes, the one who now works for the UN - has leaked that the US is extending Bashar al-Asad a deal. Mr. B. is the man who insisted Syria had taken in Saddam's WMD long after the US investigation team had determined there were no Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq. He lied about Syria being a part of Khan's Pakistani nuclear club and insisted Syria was pushing forward with a secret nuclear plan. He never tired of saying Syria had training camps for mujahidiin.

Why is he leaking this story? One can only guess. Certainly, Mr. B is that last person who wants to see a US-Syria deal go through. Perhaps one is in the works? Perhaps some in Washington want to offer Syria a deal, but it is only in the discussion phase? The way to make sure it doesn't happen is to give advanced warning to those who would scuttle it.

More:
http://faculty-staff.ou.edu/L/Joshua.M.Landis-1/syriablog/2005/10/is-us-syrian-deal-in-offing.htm

[teryang]

6. The more Syria cooperates the more abuse they get

Why bother? They ought to do everything they are accused of doing. I don't know if either regime could survive it but it would end the farce in Washington.

[ElectroPrincess]

7. Don't forget that Putin has made no secret that SYRIA is considered

a FRIEND to Russia. Hum ... makes one wonder?

[pinniped]

8. They always label potential targets as "regime."

Meanwhile, they have the biggest criminal regime of the 20th century.

[allemand]

9. "No Deal in the Qadhafi Way," Says Syria

Ibrahim Hamidi in today's al-Hayat (15 Oct. 05) writes in an article entitled, "Damascus Denies any Deal with the US along "Qadhafi" lines, but Offers to Resume Intelligence Cooperation with Washington."

Egypt's intelligence chief, General `Amr Sulayman, secretly visited Damascus recently to try to arrange the resumption of intelligence exchanges between Syria and the US. America has not responded. This is because Syria is demanding that such exchanges take place in an "atmosphere of mutual trust." America must stop its media campaign against Syria and recognize openly that Syria is assisting it in Iraq an elsewhere.

(...)

The Syrian government denies that Syria is implicated in the Hariri murder and says it does not fear its results. The implication is that Syria as not guilty as Libya was and will not go down Qadhafi's road.

The stand-off continues for now. Bolton's leak to journalists in London yesterday that Syria was being offered a "Qadhafi" deal could only have been meant to scuttle any understanding between the two countries. If Bolton were interested in the success of such a deal, rather than regime-change, he would have at the very least called it a Sadat deal. You have to love Bolton, America's WMD. Who is making American policy anyway? Poor Condaleezza Rice.

http://faculty-staff.ou.edu/L/Joshua.M.Landis-1/syriablog/2005/10/no-deal-in-qadhafi-way-says-syria.htm

[fshrink]

10. PNAC continues unfolding.

I suspect US and other "intelligences" have worked since soon after the invasion to set up Syria as another blatant bad guy so as to warrant its destabilization ala Iraq, thus throwing the entire ME, possibly including Turkey, in an endless mess. Problem is that Assad is not Saddam, that Russia is sensitive to Syria and that, with the now obvious US manipulation of data and opinion on the WMD, the set up in question needs to be pretty big, and therefore difficult to covertly engineer (even for the Mossad). It is reasonable to suspect that the assassination of Hariri was, at least in part, such an attempt. For lack of a catastrophic event (for the time being), continuous harassment and pressure on Syria is the best tactical option.

[bemildred]

11. Another bullshit offensive.

Been going on for weeks now.

[lovuian]

12. Giving Assad an ultimatum!!! We are playing a terible game

here!!! They don't have a good replacement for Assad and yet he is very unpredictable if he stays!!!