Kerry: Urgent to Set Date for Geneva II, Establish ‘Transitional’ Syrian Govt

Insists Assad Has 'Lost All Legitimacy'

Secretary of State John Kerry is calling on the international community for an “urgent” approval of an official date for the Geneva II conference on Syria’s Civil War, saying it is time to install a new “transitional” government in power.

“There has to be a transition government, there has to be a new governing entity in Syria in order to permit the possibility of peace,” insisted Kerry, adding that President Bashar Assad would not be allowed to play any role in the new, US-imposed government.

This is another round of Kerry setting the stage for US intervention in Syria, but the Geneva II conference was supposed to be in June but the US was unable to convince any Syrian rebels to go along with it. Much of the rebellion has similarly ruled out participating in the conference now.

Given this situation, it’s hard to imagine what Kerry hopes to realistically accomplish, as a Geneva summit which includes only Assad government officials and no rebels seems like a particularly unlikely place to try to install a new, Assad-less government.

With the OPCW engaged in chemical weapons disarmament in Syria for the next year it also seems like a particularly complicated time for the US to try to install an entirely new government.

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.