Asif Haroon Raja “In the coming days the American people will learn that the (US) Intelligence Community knew that Syria did not drop a military chemical weapon on innocent civilians in Idlib.” – Former DIA Col Patrick Lang The civil war was triggered in Syria in March 2011 by the Syrian rebels supported by the US, NATO, Saudi led Gulf States and Turkey. The war has wrought havoc and the country lay utterly ruined. Nearly 470,000 people including 50,000 children have died in the conflict and 4.8 million have fled the country. The cities and infrastructure are destroyed, there is very little electricity, 80% are living in poverty, and economy has shrunk by 55%. Syria war is the worst man-made disaster since 2 nd World War. But for the Iranian and Hezbollah ground support and Russian air intervention in September 2015 in support of the beleaguered Bashar al Assad regime, a regime change would have occurred long time back and Assad would have met the fate of Saddam and Qa
A week back steamy headlines made it to the front pages and Security News Alerts: Iran may act as negotiator with Assad, Syrian President. It is no secret that Rouhani’s government has been deemed friendly, forward looking, and less fanatical than its predecessors. So must Iran with a freshly signed nuclear deal, our new member on the bandwagon for global peace, play a role in convincing Syria’s Assad to hop aboard too? Possibly yes. But will the Arab League, Turkey and Washington’s other allies allow for such bold acceptance of the pariah state? While Putin was able to pen his plea for caution in ‘The’ New York Times; and Wikileaks, Bradley Manning, and the latest NSA spying scandal courtesy Edward Snowden had raised question marks in blindly trusting audience; the Syrian imbroglio remains perturbed and unchecked. Ticking like a time bomb, with dozens killed on a weekly basis, the state of war in Syria needs to be addressed. Then who must step in? So far the Iranian gover