Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2015-10-07-Speech-3-032-000"
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"en.20151007.7.3-032-000"2
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"Mr President, in the tragedy that is Syria it is difficult to know where to start: 310 000 people killed, countless more lives ruined through injury or bereavement, 4.5 million refugees, seven million internally displaced people. With the scale of this tragedy there is little wonder that the humanitarian consequences are quite literally washing up on our shores and I very much echo comments of colleagues on the humanitarian consequences of this tragedy.
Our Group has always stressed that the only solution in Syria, the only way in which we can create a safe environment for people to return to, is a political solution. There was a time when concerted intervention by the international community could have helped, but we remain deeply sceptical on current air strikes against the so-called Islamic State. We have seen 7 000 US strikes, and we now see informal US, UK and French engagement, but to little avail. We are tackling the symptoms, rather than the cause.
Adam Garfinkle, a US diplomat turned academic, has criticised US policy on ISIS, and I think his criticism applies to French and British policy also. Tackling ISIS is akin to thinking that you can alter the position of a shadow by doing things to the shadow. We are not tackling the right things. Likewise, we should not be fooled by the actions of Russia in this conflict. Sergei Ivanov, the Kremlin’s Chief of Staff, says, and I quote: ‘The military aim of our operations will exclusively be to provide air support to Syrian Government forces in the struggle against ISIS.’ Yet Russian attacks have been in areas with no ISIS presence – against Free Syrian Army positions in Latakia, Homs, Hama and even Aleppo.
The Assad regime has killed eight times more people than ISIS. This Parliament hosted the Caesar exhibition, evidence of brutal torture by this regime. Assad is not a partner in peace. He is the primary obstacle to it and we must not drift towards the Assad regime in order to try to build a viable peace. We must facilitate a wider international engagement and raise our game."@en1
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