Syrian Opposition Rules Out Peace Talks

Won't Go to Geneva Unless It's to Talk Regime Change

Syrian National Coalition (SNC) President Ahmad al-Jabra has ruled out his faction attending the Geneva II peace talks, or indeed any other peace talks, saying that they’d never meet with the Assad government, or with Iran.

Jabra said he would go to a future conference in Geneva so long as it was entirely a discussion of “a successful transfer of power” discussing the installation of his faction as the new government.

That’s clearly not happening, since the SNC doesn’t command the loyalty of very many of the rebel fighting forces on the ground, and even if they somehow were installed as the new government, the civil war would just transition to one between them and al-Qaeda.

That’s one of the many reasons why the Geneva II talks likely won’t happen at all, since none of the rebel groups have agreed to attend, and some of the biggest ones haven’t even been invited.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.