Opposition may accept role for Al Assad’s party

Beirut: The leader of Syria’s main opposition group said on Monday that he would not oppose a role for members of President Bashar Al Assad’s ruling Baath party in the country’s political future as long as they did not participate in killings during the uprising.

The comments by Syrian National Council (SNC) head Abdul Basit Sida appear to be a softening of the opposition’s stance that it will accept nothing less than the complete removal of the Al Assad regime and the president’s inner circle. He told The Associated Press that the Turkey-based SNC will meet next week in Qatar and will discuss, among other things, the possibility of Vice-President Farouq Al Shar’a serving as interim leader if Al Assad steps down.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said on Saturday that Al Shar’a was a figure “whose hands are not contaminated in blood” and therefore acceptable to Syrian opposition groups.

“We are with any solution that stops the killings in Syria and respect the ambitions of the Syrian people in what guarantees that there will be no return to dictatorship and tyranny in Syria,” Abdul Basit said by telephone from Turkey.

When asked about Al Shar’a, Abdul Basit said: “We have no information that he participated in the killings or gave orders but he belongs to the political leadership.”

Syrian officials say Al Assad will remain in his post until his seven-year term ends in 2014 followed by an election between Al Assad and other candidates.

Abdul Basit said the Syrian opposition will not repeat a policy carried out in Iraq years ago when members of Saddam Hussain’s Baath party were forced to leave their jobs after his government was overthrown during the 2003 US-led invasion.

De-Baathification, a concept started under the US-led Coalition Provisional Authority which ruled Iraq after the invasion, was an Iraqi government policy of trying to purge important government jobs and positions of former mid- and high-ranking members of the Baath Party.

“We will not repeat the failed experience of de-Baathification,” Abdul Basit said. “We will just remove all its [Baath party’s] illegitimate privileges and officials who committed crimes will be put on trial,” he added. “The Baath party will practise its activities in accordance with the democratic process. We will not have a revenge policy and we will preserve state institutions,” he said.

Activists reported violence in different parts of the country, mostly in the central city of Homs, the northern city of Aleppo, and the southern region of Daraa.

Activists estimate about 30,000 people have been killed in the 18-month-old uprising that has morphed into a civil war.

Last week, officials decided to re-open schools that had been closed for weeks due to dangerous conditions. But children who lined up on Monday morning found they had nowhere to go.

“They told us schools would reopen on Monday. So we sent our children to schools this morning but unfortunately they had to come back. They told us the schools were still closed,” said Isa Tokdemir, a father of two.

Turkey has vowed to retaliate against the shelling from Syria and Turkey’s parliament last week approved a bill that would allow cross border military operations there.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has warned Syria not to test his government’s patience.