DAMASCUS, 20 January 2005 — Arms deals are not on the agenda for Syrian President Bashar Assad’s visit to Moscow next week, official media said yesterday, dismissing Israeli claims Damascus wanted to buy new high-tech Russian missiles. “It is certain that the president’s forthcoming visit to Moscow will not focus on the arms issue,” said the ruling Baath party’s mouthpiece ahead of Bashar’s visit Monday. “The regional problems of Palestine, Iraq and (Middle East) peace will top the agenda as Russia is one of the sponsors of the peace process,” the paper’s editor Elias Murad wrote in a signed editorial.
“All this furor about a missile sale is a vain attempt to sabotage President Assad’s visit and influence its outcome. The question of arms supplies is a matter for Syria and Russia. Any third party intervention is an unacceptable interference in the affairs of the two sovereign countries.”
Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom said last week he had appealed to Russia to abandon what he said were plans to sell its latest-generation Iskander missile system to Syria. “We spoke to the Russians and we asked them to scrap this contract,” Shalom said.
The Iskander — also known as the SS-26 — is the updated version of the Soviet-era Scud missile used by Saddam Hussein’s Iraq against Israel during the Gulf War.
First tested in 1996, it has a range of just under 300 kilometers, enough to reach just about anywhere in Israel from Syria. But Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov strongly denied Russia had any plans to sell the missile to Syria. “There are no negotiations taking place over this particular issue,” he said. “We don’t have any hidden topics in our relations with Syria.”
Bashar’s Jan. 24-27 trip is the first to Russia by a Syrian head of state since his late father Hafez al-Assad visited in July 1999.
Meanwhile, US Secretary of State-designate Condoleezza Rice on Tuesday warned Syria may face new US sanctions if it maintains its ties to terrorists and cross-border help for insurgents in neighboring Iraq.
“I think that it’s fair to say that the Syrian government is behaving in a way that could unfortunately lead to long-term bad relations with the United States,” Rice said during her Senate confirmation hearing.
The outgoing national security adviser reiterated Washington’s appeal to Damascus to cut its ties to terrorism and stop funneling assistance to Iraqis battling the US-installed government in Baghdad. “We have, thanks to the Syrian Accountability Act, some tools,” she said in a reference to legislation enacted in 2003 to halt Damascus’ support for terrorism. “But we will have to mobilize them because Syria should not be, but is, thus far not a constructive force.” President George W. Bush warned Syria last month against “meddling” in Iraq and said Washington had a variety of diplomatic and economic measures it could take.
