As human rights violations and war crimes increase in Syria by governments’ forces, foreigner and rebels it is critical to take wise decisions in regard of arming any group. Any assistance that would potentially add to the violations must be studied first.
Not long ago The UN Commission of Inquiry on Syria reported usage of chemical weapons, which is banned under international war law, most likely by opposition groups in Syria.
Now our policy makers are considering arming the rebels to speed up the “freedom process” in this country.
Here are some questions that politicians might want to answer:
- So… are we arming them so they do not use banned weapons?
- Can we even trust a group who has violated international law already?
- How can we make sure we are arming the “right” group, since there are number of opposition groups fighting in Syria? How do we know we are not arming the extremists who are targeting minority groups?
Yes, we all now we have very good intelligence agencies that tell us who is “right” and who is “wrong”, but how come our intelligent “intelligence agencies” did not inform McCain that the person he is taking picture with is responsible for kidnapping Shia pilgrims a year ago?
Seems like knowing “right” from “wrong” is not that easy in case of Syria.
SRW believes no weapon that endangers lives of civilians should be sent to a trouble country such as Syria. Not only that, but also ALL foreigners should exit the country and foreigner’s’ financial aids to all groups in Syria must be stopped except humanitarian aids that can be used for ease the pain of the civilians.
Syria has become a very difficult situation for all parties and groups. Now that we are in such a mess sending more weapons might not be the best solution, after all weapons are used to kill not to bring peace!
By: Hawraa , Human rights activist and specialist. June 11th, 2013
