Bashar al-Assad, the current Syrian president and the root cause of the Syrian crisis, said in an interview to be broadcast on Friday that Western countries had sent security officials to help his government covertly in fighting Islamist militants that fight in Syria.
Assad said Western states – who are strongly opposed to his rule but also face the threat of Islamist attacks at home – were secretly cooperating with his government in counter-terrorism operations.
The interview was made in remarks to Australia’s SBS News channel that were carried by Syrian state media,
“They attack us politically and then they send officials to deal with us under the table, especially the security, including your [the Australian] government,” Assad was quoted as saying.
“They don’t want to upset the United States. Actually most of the Western officials, they only repeat what the United States want them to say. This is the reality,” he said.
There was no immediate comment from Western governments.
The Syrian crisis started as a peaceful uprising six years ago asking to end injustice in the country. However, Assad regime used violence and brutality against civilians and forces people to hold arms. During the chaos, extremists appeared and sought to achieve their own agendas.
Western powers have supported rebels fighting Assad regime and have called for him to step down to ease a future democratic transition. He has refused, vowing to fight on until Damascus regains control of all of Syria. His main allies have been Russia and Iran.
However, the west focuses always on the extremists forgetting the root cause of the trouble who must be removed from power first.
According to UN estimates, more than 450.000 were killed in Syria during the past six years, while 12 million were displaced and lost their homes, 8 millions if them are outside Syria scattered around the world.
