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 Syria Ends Emergency Rule as Opposition Gains MomentumPosted on Apr 19, 2011
Syria has moved out of emergency rule after 48 years as President Bashar al-Assad tried Tuesday to appease the pro-democracy movement that has addled him for weeks. The New York Times reports that Assad’s government is offering concessions with one hand while crushing opposition with the other: “Since the uprising began, the government has vacillated between crackdown and suggestions of compromise, a formula that proved fatal for strongmen in Tunisia and Egypt. But the combination Tuesday was most remarkable for how divergent it was. It legalized peaceful protests — coded language for those approved by the government — as the Interior Ministry warned in a statement carried by the official news agency that it would bring to bear the full breadth of the law against any other kind.” The Guardian wrote that by giving ground to his opposition, Assad has begun paving the way for his own fall from power. —KDG Advertisement Previous item: Airstrikes Alone Aren't Enough in Eastern Libya Next item: Pulitzer Source Says New York Times Didn't Submit WikiLeaks Reporting New and Improved CommentsWe are launching a major overhaul of our comments section. In addition to more robust spam filtering and moderation, new features include the ability to rate other comments, sort how they are displayed and respond directly via e-mail or in a thread. Unfortunately, commenters will lose their existing Truthdig identities. It's a pain, we know, but on the plus side you will now be able to log in with a plethora of options, including Google, Twitter, Facebook and Disqus accounts. Before launching this system we spent months in discussion with our top commenters. We listened to the feedback and we hope you like what we've come up with. Please direct any problems or concerns to us via our contact page. |
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By The Worden Report, May 3, 2011 at 7:51 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
Excellent question! It strikes me that the killing of 500 protesters in Syria in March/April 2011 suggests a quantitative criterion. Perhaps a territorial one could be added as well. For instance, are the trouble-spots limited to a few metro areas, or across a state? I am shying away from the use of “majority” because a ruler need not have violently turned against a majority of the people to be reckoned as having turned on his or her people. Of course, as you point out, the determination of criteria itself is subjective. It could thus interfer with an international mechanism if there is not even sufficient agreement that the criteria have been met in a given case. Clearly, it would not be easy for the world to step up to the plate in defending people’s human rights against rulers.
Report thisBy Blackspeare, April 21, 2011 at 9:32 am Link to this comment
The Worden Report: Excellent analysis of current situations and those yet to come, but what criteria to use?!
Report thisBy The Worden Report, April 19, 2011 at 2:45 pm Link to this comment
So it sounds like the lifting of emergency rule is a bit of a red herring. I am troubled by the inconsistency as the world clamps down on Libya’s regime while looking the other way on Syria. In my essay at http://thewordenreport.blogspot.com/2011/03/discordant-voices-on-military-options.html, I argue that systematic improvements can result from lessons learned such that the world could have a mechanism in place to deal with autocrats who turn on their own people.
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