Middle East analyst Veysel Ayhan: Ceasefire in Syria not likely to last
As the UN Security Council voted unanimously to authorize unarmed observers to go to Syria and monitor the cease-fire, an expert on Middle Eastern affairs has told Today’s Zaman for Monday Talk that the truce is not likely to last long.
“The Syrian government has broken promises in the past, and so far ignored a key provision of the Annan plan to pull troops back to barracks. It is possible that Assad is stepping back tactically, said Veysel Ayhan of Abant İzzet Baysal University in Turkey.
As reports of deadly clashes surface across Syria, Ayhan expects that the Syrian regime will blame deaths on the opposition.
“Therefore, it is important to have a team of UN observers in Syria to find out what’s happening,” he added.
Kofi Annan, the envoy for the UN and the Arab League, drew up the plan that called for an advance monitoring team to be deployed immediately to Syria to observe compliance with the truce. The Annan Plan aims to end more than a year of violence in Syria, which the UN says has killed more than 9,000 people, mostly civilians.
The resolution passed on Saturday expresses an intention to establish a full mission once there is a sustained end of violence. The text “calls upon all parties in Syria, including the opposition, immediately to cease all armed violence in all its forms.”