Wednesday, May 16, 2012
(From THE WALL STREET JOURNAL)
By Nour Malas
An umbrella group of the Syrian government's fractious opponents on Tuesday re-elected its president for another three-month term, in a contentious vote that could deepen divisions and set back efforts to gain international backing for its uprising against the Assad regime.
The Syrian National Council extended the term of Burhan Ghalioun, a 67-year-old academic who has led the council since September, after days of negotiations among council members in Rome and Geneva.
Some opposition activists criticized the choice, saying Mr. Ghalioun heads a group of mostly self-appointed leaders in exile who are increasingly disconnected from the plight of protesters inside Syria. Those critics also say he is too closely allied with a Muslim Brotherhood faction within the group.
The vote came as United Nations monitors, who are overseeing a nominal cease-fire, narrowly escaped injury in the town of Khan Shaykoun, near Hama, when their convoy of four vehicles was struck by an explosion, said a spokesman for Kofi Annan, the former U.N. secretary-general who is heading the mission.
The blast from an improvised explosive device damaged three U.N. vehicles but didn't injure any of the monitors.
Opposition activists said the explosion came after security forces opened fire on a funeral procession in the town, killing at least 20 people.
Mr. Ghalioun, a Sunni Muslim from the city of Homs -- the epicenter of the antigovernment movement -- faced off in the opposition vote against George Sabra, a Christian council member whose presidential prospects many in the SNC had hoped would reassure Syria's religious minorities.
Messrs. Ghalioun and Sabra didn't respond to requests to comment. Mr. Ghalioun, in a televised interview on Tuesday, said the council would continue to work to represent Syria's patchwork of ethnic and religious groups.
Even before Mr. Ghalioun's re-election, disagreements within the SNC, and broader rifts among opposition groups led the Arab League to postpone a conference in Cairo this week to again try to unite the opposition.
Across the country for weeks, some activists have brandished signs saying "The SNC does not represent me," criticizing the political infighting that has seen some of Syria's top dissidents walk away from the group.
Some members who have split from the council protest what they call a monopoly on influence by the Muslim Brotherhood, one of the SNC's seven political factions.
The Brotherhood is allied with Mr. Ghalioun in a power-sharing agreement that these critics say places Mr. Ghalioun as the secular, liberal front for an Islamist-dominated opposition.
"The SNC is a corpse, which the entire international community is desperately trying to resuscitate," said Fawaz Tello, a veteran opposition figure who left Syria this year to work with the Istanbul- and Paris-based body.
Mr. Tello said he planned to resign from the council Tuesday, saying it had failed to restructure to become more inclusive, transparent and democratic.
The SNC's fragile standing has hurt international efforts to mold the body into the type of transitional council with accountable leadership and street credibility that governments would feel more comfortable supporting.
The perceived leadership gap has allowed for other networks of both peaceful and armed activists to develop across Syria, with their own patrons abroad. Recent bombings have put the more peaceful movements at risk of being hijacked by extremists.
In Binnish, a restive town near the border with Turkey, some protesters on Tuesday chanted against "those protesting in hotels" -- a reference to the SNC's members, mostly Syrians who have long lived in exile for their political views.
Those activists have spent the past year lobbying Western and Arab governments for funds, arms and political support -- with little success beyond recognition as an umbrella group for the opposition, many SNC members say.
This kind of discord within the opposition movement threatens international efforts to stem the violence and find a way out of the conflict.
Most Western governments are now focused on a U.N.-backed peace plan that calls for a political settlement between President Bashar al-Assad and his opponents.
But disputes in the opposition -- as well as ceasefire violations by the regime -- appear to prevent any attempt to bring the two sides closer to an agreement, while Syria's government also continues to crack down on political opponents while making gestures at changes.
On Tuesday, it announced a 51% voter turnout in parliamentary elections held last week as the country's first multiparty vote in five decades, a vote the opposition had boycotted.
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
16-05-12 0359GMT
