Russia opposes ‘unbalanced’ draft resolution on Syria

U.N. humanitarian chief Valerie Amos said on Friday the Syrian government had agreed to join U.N. agencies in a "limited assessment" of the situation in the country, where government forces continued a crackdown on rebels.
   
Speaking at a news conference in the Turkish capital Ankara, Amos said she had asked the Syrian government for unhindered aid access to worst-hit areas, but the Syrian government had requested more time.

The World Health Organization said on Friday it is enlisting the help of Syrian medical students and local aid workers to conduct a survey of health needs in four areas where opposition forces have clashed with government troops.    

WHO spokesman Tarik Jasarevic says Syria's health ministry granted permission for a "very preliminary and basic survey" of health needs to be done next week.       

The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs also wants access to provide badly needed medical help, food and basic supplies.  

Meanwhile, the leader of Syria's main opposition group rejected calls Friday by U.N. envoy Kofi Annan for dialogue with President Bashar Assad's government, saying they were pointless and unrealistic as the regime massacres its own people.             

In a telephone interview from Paris, Burhan Ghalioun, who heads the opposition Syrian National Council, told The Associated Press that Annan already has disappointed the Syrian people.       

Annan, who has been appointed joint U.N.-Arab League envoy to Syria, has said his mission was to start a "political process" to resolve the conflict in the country. He is due this weekend in Syria where he will meet with Assad.       

In comments made in Cairo on Thursday after talks with Arab League chief Nabil Elaraby, Annan warned against further militarization of the Syrian conflict and urged the opposition to come together with the government to find a political solution.          

Annan also said he would be making "realistic" proposals to resolve the conflict. He did not elaborate.      

But Ghalioun blasted such statements as unrealistic.         

Syrian activists also rejected Annan's call for dialogue.      

"It seems he lives on Mars," said Mohammad Saeed, an activist in the Damascus suburb of Douma.  

On a separate note, Russia earlier announced that it opposed an “unbalanced” U.S.-backed U.N. draft resolution on the Syrian crisis because it did not include a call for a simultaneous halt of violence by the government and rebels. “We cannot agree with the draft resolution in the form it is being presented in today. The text of the resolution under discussion is unbalanced,” Interfax quoted Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov as saying.    

China, which dispatched an envoy to Syria this week, said on Friday it would send an assistant foreign minister to the Middle East and to France to discuss the crisis. Beijing has told other powers not to use humanitarian aid to "interfere" in Syria.      

Meanwhile, Turkey's state-run television reported on Friday that two Syrian generals and a colonel have defected to Turkey as the Syrian forces appeared to be targeting more rebellious areas, including the northern province of Idlib near Turkey.         

Reuters/AP/LBCI