Kamis 14 Mar 2013 21:15 WIB

France wants to be able to arm Syrian opposition

Foto: AP/SANA

A Syrian firefighter extinguishes at the scene where two mortar rounds exploded near an orphanage, at al-Boukhtyar area, in Damascus, Syria, Wednesday March 13, 2013.

REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, PARIS - France is ready to help arm Syrian opposition fighters and is pushing for an urgent European Union meeting on lifting its arms embargo on Syria, the French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said on Thursday.

Laurent Fabius suggested France and Britain are ready to brush aside concerns by other European countries about the embargo in their push to help the Syrian opposition, but the British side was more cautious on its position. Russia, which is supplying weapons to the Syrian military, strongly opposes arms supplies to the rebels — and some international diplomats warn that more weapons is the last thing that Syria needs right now after a two-year civil war that has left 70,000 dead.

"Lifting the embargo is one of the only means left to make things move politically" in Syria, Fabius said on France-Info radio.

Asked if France should arm the opposition, Fabius said, "Yes." Asked if France and Britain could join efforts to arm the opposition, Fabius said, "to lift the embargo, exactly."

He said France and Britain will ask for an EU meeting on lifting the embargo "now," possibly by the end of this month. Britain's Foreign Office said in a statement Thursday that the international effort for a political solution in Syria "has little chance of gathering momentum unless the regime feels compelled to come to the negotiating table. They need to feel that the balance on the ground has shifted against them."

Referring to the EU embargo, the statement said, "We are not prepared to rule out any options to bring an end to the suffering of millions of innocent Syrians."

The current embargo expires in May. If EU partners don't agree on lifting the embargo imminently, Fabius said that France and Britain could refuse to renew it. British Prime Minister David Cameron hinted this week that the UK might withhold approval for an extension of the arms embargo when it is due to expire in May. Cameron and other EU leaders are likely to discuss Syria at a summit in Brussels on Thursday and Friday.

But talk of arming the rebels comes as concerns have been raised about abuses by opposition fighters. Human rights monitors said in a report Thursday that Syrian opposition members routinely kill captured soldiers and suspected regime informers. However the report also said that abuses by the Assad regime remain far more deadly, systematic and widespread.