Russia faces delicate dilemma over Syria
MOSCOW — Russia’s attempt to backpedal after a top diplomat said Syrian President Bashar Assad is losing control of his country reflects the dilemma Moscow faces as opposition fighters gain ground.
Throughout the Syrian crisis, Russia has tried to walk a fine line — eschewing statements of outright support for Assad while blocking international attempts to pressure him to stop the fighting or to leave power altogether.
Instead, Russia has insisted that negotiations are the only way to resolve the crisis and has portrayed itself as a principled opponent of foreign intervention.
The strategy, however, has led some to view Moscow’s stance as a disingenuous attempt to prop up a dictator in a country where activists say more than 40,000 people have been killed since March 2011.
As the fighting in Syria intensified over recent months, Russian officials have held back from public assessments of whether Assad’s regime would survive. But on Thursday, Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov was quoted by major Russian news agencies as saying “there is a trend for the government to progressively lose control over an increasing part of the territory” and “an opposition victory can’t be excluded.”
On Friday, the Foreign Ministry issued a convoluted denial, saying its top envoy for Syria was merely characterizing the opinion of the Syrian opposition rather than stating Russia’s view.
“In that context, Bogdanov again confirmed Russia’s principled stance that a political settlement in Syria has no alternative,” ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said in a statement.
While Bogdanov’s statement seemed to signal Russia’s attempt to begin positioning itself for Assad’s eventual defeat, the Foreign Ministry’s backtracking clearly indicated that Moscow has no intention yet of pulling away from its Mideast ally.
This was reinforced by Syrian Deputy Prime Minister Qadri Jamil, who was in Moscow on Friday to meet with Bogdanov and his boss, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.
“There have been no changes in Russia’s position,” Jamil told journalists after the meeting.
Facing further questions Friday about Bogdanov’s statement, Lukashevich insisted there had been no shift in the Russian position on Syria. He said Moscow is continuing to call for a political dialogue between the Syrian government and the opposition on the basis of the peace plan agreed upon at an international conference in June.
“Our only goal is to end the violence in Syria as quickly as possible, start a dialogue between the Syrians, between the government and the opposition, and work out a formula for advancing a political process,” Lukashevich said.
Georgy Mirsky, a leading Mideast expert with the Institute for World Economy and International Relations, a top foreign policy think-tank supported by the Russian government, said Bogdanov may have slipped up.
“Bogdanov went very far, and the question is whether he co-ordinated his statement with Lavrov,” the analyst said. “If he didn’t, he may have gotten himself in trouble.”
Mirsky said it would be difficult for Russian President Vladimir Putin to dump Assad.
“It would amount to a loss of face, look like caving in to Western pressure. That’s not in his character,” Mirsky said. “Russia is going to lose Syria anyway. But if it’s lost as a result of Assad’s ouster or killing or a coup by his own men, it wouldn’t look like Putin’s defeat. But he would look very bad indeed if even he doesn’t wait for Bashar Assad to go away.”
The U.S. quickly commended Russia on Thursday for “waking up to the reality” by acknowledging the Syrian regime’s impending fall, but Lukashevich lashed back, saying that “we haven’t fallen asleep.”
“We haven’t changed our position and we won’t,” he said.
Russia maintains a naval base at the Syrian port of Tartus, the only such outpost outside the ex-Soviet Union serving Russian navy ships in the Mediterranean and hosting an unspecified number of military personnel. Russia also has an unspecified number of military advisers teaching Syrians how to use Russian weapons, which make up the bulk of Syria’s arsenal.