Syrian Arab News Agency S A N A
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New York, SANA – Syria’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Bashar al-Jaafari reiterated calls for the Security Council to condemn the governments of states that support terrorism and compel them to abide by relevant resolutions, specifically counterterrorism resolutions.
In a statement delivered at the Security Council on Friday, al-Jaafari said that the threats to international peace and security posed by international terrorism and organized crime wouldn’t have become so grave if terrorist organizations hadn’t been linked organically and bound by interests with governments of states that chose terrorism as a course and tool in their foreign policy.
Syria’s Representative said that terrorist acts show the nature of the obscurantist, excisional mentality of Al Qaeda-affiliated terrorist organizations, adding “but at the same time, these acts make as stronger and more determined to exert further serious efforts to eliminate the plague of terrorism.”
He called upon UN member states and relevant organizations within and without the UN to emerge from their short-sighted political cocoons and increase international and regional efforts and cooperation to eliminate terrorism and crime as well as their sponsors.
Al-Jaafari referred to a document drawn up at the Security Council which discussed the growing war economy in Syria in light of the current crisis, saying that while this document is important, it ignored a blatant truth in the same way that several member states in the Council and outside it, and this truth is that the results described in the document didn’t come from nowhere; rather they are the result of policies and practices of certain states’ governments that worked to escalate and extend the crisis in Syria by providing all sorts of support to armed terrorist organizations, seeking to undermine the Syrian state and its establishment, employing terrorism as a political weapon, and obstructing a peaceful political solution based on Syrian-led comprehensive national dialogue among all Syrians.
He noted that Syria repeatedly reported the various acts committed by terrorist organizations – primarily ISIS and Jabhet al-Nusra – which include extracting and selling the petroleum which belongs to Syria and Iraq, stealing and trading in archeological artifacts, dismantling factories and transporting their machinery to Turkey, abduction and hostage-taking, and human trafficking of women and children.
Syria’s Representative said that throughout three years, three permanent Security Council members prevented the UN from taking any practical steps to confront terrorism, with these states and others remaining content to limit their actions to timid condemnations.
Al-Jaafari said that in April 2013, the EU permitted the purchase of Syrian petroleum from what it called “areas controlled by the opposition” in a flagrant violation of the very same international law that some of the EU countries boast about, adding that the EU recently took steps to prevent Syrian civilian airlines from procuring fuel, which is an irresponsible and illegal behavior that violates the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).
He went on to note that the EU refrained from taking any action about stolen Syrian archeological artifacts which were smuggled to Europe, referring to recent statements to the Times newspaper by the Europol former deputy director and the Commander of the Belgian Federal Police, which revealed that dealers in the west are now dealing with ISIS directly, while before they employed middlemen to buy artifacts stolen from the Middle East.
Syria’s Representative said that the Security Council’s decision which was approved on 28/7/2014 on prohibiting trading in Syrian petroleum with ISIS and Jabhet al-Nusra was a good first step in the right direction in counterterrorism, with the Council adopting decisions nos. 2170 and 2178 to further bolster this step, adding that despite that, continuing to overlook the actions of the governments that support terrorism in the Middle East and elsewhere will certainly undermine any possibility of achieving actual results in counterterrorism and combating international organized crime.
He also referred to several UN reports, including reports from experts investigating the situation in Libya, which prove that several countries – particularly Turkey – are involved in transporting weapons and terrorists from Libya to Syria and Egypt.
Al-Jaafari reiterated the Syrian delegation’s demand that the Security Council condemn the governments that support terrorism – primary among which are Turkey, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia, in addition to compelling these governments to cease their destructive practices, holding them accountable, and forcing them to abide by relevant Security Council on counterterrorism, including resolutions no. 1267, 1373, 1540, 1624, 1989, 2133, 2170, and 2178, all of which were issued under Chapter Seven.
He pointed out that the Syrian delegation provided the analytical team for the committee on resolution no. 1267 date and a list of great importance on the foreign terrorists killed in Syria recently, noting that the list includes names of 110 people from Chechnya, Caucasus, Dagestan, and other areas, saying that the list will be provided to member states very soon.
Syria’s Representative concluded the statement by referring to an important report issued in Washington recently under the title “Qatar and Terror Finance” which tackles Qatar’s support for terrorism not only in Syria, but also around the world.
Hazem Sabbagh
