“This is a dictatorship without a dictator,” a Damascus-based Western diplomat said. Ammar Abdulhamid, a human rights activist, agreed: “It’s a mafia. The capo di tutti capi has died but Michael Corleone [the tough son in the Godfather] is missing and Fredo [the weak son] is in charge.” … Abdulhamid, who has avoided prison so far, said: “It [the regime] is going to come crashing down. They are wishful dreamers if they think they can carry on. They are relics. They have lost their survival skills.”
Tag: UN
Reform starts with a Lebanon withdrawal
Special to The Daily Star
The Syrian regime did not have to find itself in the precarious position it is in today, maligned by all for its behavior. It did not have to find itself facing sanctions imposed by the United States. It did not have to face United Nations Security Council Resolution 1559, calling for a Syrian pullout from Lebanon. And it did not have to face the outrage expressed after the assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.
Syria’s salvation is through reform
Special to The Daily Star
Despite the current mood of optimism prevailing in Syria due to the success of President Bashar Assad’s recent visit to Moscow, the country continues to face a very serious situation because of its poor relations with the United States and the international community. The Bush administration still denounces Damascus for what it says is Syrian meddling in Iraq; and the international community as a whole continues to deride Syria’s overt and well-documented interference in Lebanese affairs.
Letter from Damascus: Superhighway to Damascus
BookForum – Jan/Dec 2005
One of the most significant deficits in the Arab world today—and one which the highly publicized United Nations Arab Human Development Reports have so far failed to mention—is the staggering absence of young voices on the intellectual scene and in the public debate concerning societal and political reform. This is perhaps the starkest manifestation of the “knowledge gap or deficit” referred to in the reports, issued annually by the United Nations Development Program to monitor socioeconomic and political conditions in the Arab states. Arab countries, it seems, have somehow ceased to produce intellectuals—artists, novelists, poets, and political and social analysts—who could navigate new courses and harness popular sentiment to help lift their countries out of the morass in which they are mired. Continue reading “Letter from Damascus: Superhighway to Damascus”
The Ammar Abdulhamid Archive 