At the end of June, Ban Ki-moon, the secretary-general of the United Nations, issued a statement marking the third anniversary of the Geneva communique of 30 June 2012. The statement dealt with the suffering of the Syrian people that “continues to plumb new depths”, stressing that Syria is “on the brink of falling apart ... putting at risk what is already one of the most unstable regions in the world.” Over the last three months we have witnessed a new willingness on the part of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council to push for a political solution to the Syrian crisis. This positive development is due to an understanding between Moscow and Washington, and their respective allies, that the absence of a political solution would make matters worse, and would seriously undermine the security and stability of the Middle East. The Sotchi meeting between John Kerry, the US secretary of state, and Sergei Lavrov, his Russian counterpart, opened the way for a Russian-American joint position on the urgent need to bring the Syrian crisis to an end by launching a new international drive by the five permanent members of the Security Council. The Vienna Accord of 14 July between the P5+1 and Iran on the Iranian nuclear question gave an important impetus to the moves of the great powers concerning Syria. Now that the West was ready to normalise relations with Iran, Tehran could be enlisted to facilitate such a political solution. Of course, some Arabs have not been very happy with such a scenario, but the Middle East has been undergoing deep changes for the last four years and a half that have made it imperative to end of war raging in Syria. If Iran was part of the problem, from the standpoint of the Western powers prior to the Vienna Accord, it has now become a possible partner for Western governments, particularly the US administration, in the push for a solution and to guarante the future stabilty of the “new” Syria. The Iranian role is very important in solving the Bashar Al-Assad factor. Whether the Iranians will play their cards according to Western expectations remains to be seen, but I doubt it. The Iranian backing of the Syrian regime has become a cornerstone of Iranian policy in the Middle East and the Arab world. The Iranians are in no doubt that once the Syrian regime is gone, Iran's security will become vulnerable. Even its influence in the Middle East could become the next victim. The Iranians are haunted by the spectre of an “Arab Spring” style revolution inside Iran. It happened, albeit on a smaller scale, in June 2009, but it was quelled in blood. Some Western and Arab quarters hope that Tehran will use its influence in Damascus to help find a respectable way out for President Al-Assad. I guess it is not an easy question to answer. Are the Iranians willing to let go of Al-Assad, and the power structure that helps his regime, in exchange for a future normalisation of relations with the West? Incidentally, the British foreign secretary, Philip Hamond, was in Tehran on 23 August to reopen the British Embassy there. No doubt, other Western governments will follow suit. As for the Americans, it would be a surprise if they take such a step in the forseeable future, at least not before the lifting of sanctions in January, according to the Vienna Accord. The Iranians will, undoubtedly, help new international efforts to reach a political settlement to the Syrian crisis, but perhaps not at the price of chasing Al-Assad out of power. What they could settle for is new presidential elections in Syria that would be multi-candidate and under international supervision. Whoever wins will be the next Syrian president, be it President Al-Assad or someone else. They bet that the Syrian president would come out the winner. The Saudi-Iranian face-off in Syria does not help these international efforts. The Saudis recently received a high-profile representative of the Syrian government, in a move that political observers interprete as a willingness on the part of the Saudis to take the bull by the horns and steer events on the ground in Syria in the direction that they want ¾ namely, getting the Iranians out of Syria in return for Al-Assad staying in power in any transitional arrangements, as per the Geneva Communique of 2012. The said communique does not call for the removal of Al-Assad. The presidential statement of the Security Council on 17 August on Syria was drafted along similar lines. Now the spotlight is on the United States to convince their Turkish allies, as well as the Qataris, to go along with the mission of the UN's special representative in Syria, Staffan de Mistura, and give a breathing space to bring the warring Syrian parties to the negotiating table, to elaborate a framework agreement based on the de Mistura plan which aims at “operationalising” the Geneva Communique. Ban Ki-Moon made it clear that he would be willing to convene an international conference to endorse such an agreement. This framework document would “provide for a transitional governing body, procedures for a national dialogue, the constitution drafting process and transitional justice issues.” According to the US secretary general, the de Mistura consultations with the Syrians made it clear that the major stumbling block remains the issue of forming a transitional governing body with full executive powers that can create a suitable environment and safety for all during the transition. It will be a herculian task to set up such a body, taking into account the fragmentation of the Syrian opposition and the deep-seated mistrust between the Syrian government and its opponents and detractors. Whether the obstacles are great or significant, I believe that the American-Russian understandings in Sotchi and the consensus among the five permanent members of the Security Council, embodied in the 17 August presidential statement, do provide enough political guarantees that the latest efforts by de Mistura could bear fruit, on condition that the Americans rein in Erdogan of Turkey. A failure to seize the present opportunity would be highly costly for the superpowers, regional powers and Arab countries, now as well as in the long run. In this case, historians would dwell not on who lost Syria, but rather who lost the Middle East. The writer is a former assistant to the foreign minister.
