Washington: Assad must go

ROME: US Secretary of State John Kerry insisted yesterday Syrian President Bashar Assad could play no role in a transitional government, on a third day of diplomatic talks seeking to help end the conflict.
Kerry’s comments came as he met Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh in Rome to shore up US support for Amman, struggling under the weight of some 525,000 refugees who have fled across the border from Syria.
Jordan was working with the United States to “effect a transition government by mutual consent of both sides, which clearly means that in our judgment President Assad will not be a component of that transitional government,” Kerry said.
He also officially unveiled $ 100 million in additional US humanitarian aid for Syrian refugees, some $ 43 million of which will go to support UN programs in Jordan.
Ten percent of the population in Jordan was now Syrian refugees, he said. “It is expected to rise to about 20 to 25 percent given the current rates by the end of this year, and possibly to about 40 percent by the middle of 2014.”
“No country can cope with the numbers as huge as the numbers I’ve just described,” Judeh warned, adding he was to fly to Moscow later for talks on the Syrian crisis.
Plans for an international conference on Syria were also continuing, Kerry said, after agreeing Tuesday in Moscow that he and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov would work in tandem on the issue.
There is a “very positive response and a very strong desire” to find a way forward, he said after a round of telephone calls with foreign ministers.
Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal reported Israel has warned the US that Russia plans to sell sophisticated S-300 missile batteries to Syria, under a $ 900 million deal agreed in 2010.
The advanced ground-to-air weapons can take out aircraft or guided missiles, and could complicate any Western intervention to stop the bloodshed.
Meanwhile, the head of the Arab League yesterday welcomed a new effort by Russia and the US to seek a negotiated end to Syria’s civil war and called on the Syrian government and opposition to participate.
Elaraby urged Assad’s government, the opposition National Coalition and all other Syrian parties to seize the opportunity to agree on the formation of a transitional government.
In the war theater, Syrian warplanes pounded rebel targets in two northern provinces yesterday as Assad’s troops pushed on with an offensive to reclaim more territory from the opposition.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Assad’s air force was shelling rebel positions in Aleppo and Idlib. The group said regime planes were hitting rebels near the Mannagh military air base outside the northern city of Aleppo, the provincial capital.
In neighboring Idlib province, heavy clashes were underway yesterday outside several army bases near the government-controlled provincial capital, said the Observatory, which relies on a network of informants inside Syria.