Al-Jaafari at General Assembly: We're ready to receive neutral investigating committee

United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon confirmed Thursday, that the observers of the United Nations in Syria came under small arm fire while trying to reach the alleged massacre said to be conducted by forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad.                                          

In a speech delivered at the Special session for Syria at the General Assembly, Ban said that the crisis in Syria, and the alleged massacre at Al-Qubair is brutal and unspeakable and called on Assad to immediately implement international mediator Kofi Annan’s peace Plan consisting of six points.            

For his part, Arab League’s Secretary General Nabil Elaraby said that the Syrian army is still committing atrocities and harming civilians, and the Syrian government is still using the security option. “The crisis has been going for 15 months and immediate measures must be taken to put an immediate end to violence and killings”, he said.             

Elaraby said that Annan’s peace plan will not reach its goal if Damascus does not cooperate and abandon the security option. Elaraby called for punishing all those who violated Human Rights in Syria.           

Elaraby clarified that Annan’s mission was ratified by international organizations and “no one can doubt its nature”. He added that the Arab League does not call on the Security Council to resort to the military option; rather it calls for exerting political and economic pressures on the Syrian regime.              

For his part, U.N.-Arab League envoy to Syria Kofi Annan said that the crisis in Syria is getting deeper adding that his plan was not implemented. Annan condemned the new massacre that took place yesterday, stressing that mass murders are an integral part of the crisis in Syria. Annan added that violations are increasing, the crisis is exacerbating and the neighboring countries are increasingly worried.

In a related context, Syria’s ambassador to the Security Council Bashar Al-Jaafari said that the pictures published were not the pictures of victims of the so-called Al-Qubair massacre. “In many areas in Syria, heinous and unjustifiable massacres are being committed”, he said.        

Al-Jaafari stressed that Syria is open to all who wish to conduct a dialogue, adding that there was no problem with the Syrian opposition. Al-Jaafari revealed that the Syrian government spared no effort to implement Annan’s plan, pointing out that fighting terrorism goes hand in hand with halting encouragement for terrorist groups.       

Al-Jaafari concluded that his government is ready to receive a neutral investigating committee to look into the massacres.