Sunday, Nov 27, 2011


 
   By Matt Bradley in Cairo and Nour Malas in Beirut 
   Of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

The League of Arab States approved on Sunday an unprecedented set of economic sanctions on Syria for the government's bloody crackdown on protesters, paving the way for Turkish sanctions and a growing economic isolation in the region for President Bashar al-Assad's regime.

The economic penalties, which will significantly slow a teetering economy in Syria, were voted through in a 14-point sanctions plan first drafted by Arab finance officials on Saturday.

Nineteen of the league's 21 members--Syria was suspended more than two weeks ago--voted to pass the measures. Iraq, Syria's top trading partner in the Arab world, abstained, while Lebanon voted against the sanctions.

(This story and related background material will be available on The Wall Street Journal website, WSJ.com.)

Arab League Secretary-General Nabil al-Arabi said he will submit the sanctions list to the United Nations in coming days to encourage the U.N. to enforce its own measures on Syria, he said at a news conference in Cairo.

Turkey, whose foreign minister attended the Arab meeting on Sunday, agreed to adopt the league's sanctions "as a minimum" starting point, said Sheik Hamad al Thani, the prime minister and foreign minister of Qatar, who leads an Arab League committee on Syria.

The Arab sanctions include travel bans on high-level regime officials, freezing of their bank accounts, blocking the sale of "nonessential" commodities into Syria, halting transactions with the Syrian central bank, and ending financing for all Arab-funded projects in Syria. More than half of Syria's nonoil exports are sold to Arab countries.

Syria's government missed a Friday deadline to approve an Arab League plan to accept monitors in the country or risk facing the sanctions. Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem on Saturday accused the Arab League of "internationalizing" Syria's crisis and inviting foreign interference.

Representatives from seven Arab countries will meet with the league's secretary-general next week to determine which high-level Syrian officials will face travel bans. Another meeting will also determine which commodities will be barred from export to Syria. Diplomats and analysts say the pan-Arab body, which hasn't drafted such sanctions before and lacks a legal mechanism to enforce them, has likely looked to U.S. and European sanctions on Syria to model its own.

The league, until this year seen as a defunct and ceremonial body, has taken the lead on Syria's crisis, suspending its membership and following through with threats for more punitive measures if Damascus failed to pull troops from cities, release hundreds of political prisoners and allow the Arab League to dispatch observers. Syria's government has slammed the plan to dispatch monitors and wrangled with the league to change its terms, missing two deadlines in the past two weeks to sign on to the plan.

"The Arab League is at a crossroads," said Qatar's Sheikh Hamad. "There have been revolts in a lot of countries because we have not been doing our jobs," he said. "We are not 100% right, but we are trying to be correct. We are trying to take serious steps."

The league's censure of the Syrian regime could increase pressure on Syrian allies in the international community to accede to U.S. and European-backed efforts to enforce global sanctions against Assad. Russia and China have so far blocked action at the United Nations Security Council that would threaten sanctions against Syria.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

27-11-11 1838GMT