Jordan hopes to end Syria crisis
Jordan’s King Abdullah is intensifying his diplomatic efforts to end the political stalemate in neighboring Syria by seeking to put together a task force to engage the Syrian regime in a bid to change its behavior. A month after he became the first Arab leader to meet with US President Joe Biden, the king flew to Moscow this week on a working visit to discuss the Syrian crisis with President Vladimir Putin.
In a CNN interview aired while he was in Washington, King Abdullah said: “Syrian refugees are not going to go back any time soon, and that takes us to the challenge that we are now discussing with the US and the Europeans.”
He added: “Bashar Assad has legitimacy, and so the regime is there and we have to be mature in our thinking. Is it regime change or behavioral change? And if it’s behavioral change, then what do we have to do to come together to talk to the regime, because everyone else is doing it and there is no plan at the moment?”
The Jordanian leader said that the West should talk to the Russians, who are playing a vital role.
The king has maintained a special relationship with Putin over the years and he has been a frequent visitor to the Russian capital. That has helped Amman gain a pledge from the Russians to keep pro-Iranian militias in southern Syria away from Jordan’s borders.
Talks between the two leaders have covered the crisis in Daraa, where the Syrian regular army, backed by the Russian military, is besieging Syrian rebels entrenched in the old town. The fall of Daraa to the rebels last month forced Jordan to close the border crossing days after it was fully reopened.
In a related development,
King Abdullah and Putin have discussed the US offer to supply
Lebanon with Jordanian electricity through Syria in a bid to alleviate its acute energy shortage. The US gesture came in response to previous Jordanian requests, which were rejected by the former US administration. To resolve this issue logistically, Jordan will have to coordinate closely with the Syrian regime. The move will be supported by Egypt, which will supply Amman with additional quantities of natural gas.
This could pave the way for further steps toward normalizing ties with Damascus in return for concrete steps toward a revival of the peace process. Amman hopes to take the lion’s share of future reconstruction deals, especially in southern Syria. Jordan is also seeking to create positive conditions in that region to encourage hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees to return voluntarily. Meanwhile, Jordan has had to adapt to a decrease in foreign aid to assist it in responding to the Syrian refugee crisis.
It is also believed that King Abdullah’s efforts are backed by a number of Arab states, which would like to see an end to the Syrian crisis in the hope of limiting Iranian influence over Damascus. Jordan, Iraq and Egypt have formed a trilateral economic bloc and hope that Syria could join in the future.
King Abdullah is leading efforts to create a new understanding of the Syrian crisis that will pave the way for an end to the decadeold civil war, the rehabilitation of the regime and the launch of a political process with the aid of the Russians.