Syrian protesters and opposition groups have escalated their demands from more freedom to the definitive overthrow of the regime, writes Bassel Oudat in Damascus With more than 2,000 people dead, more than 1,500 missing, 12,000 detained, 15,000 forced to become refugees and around 65,000 subjected to detention or torture since the Syrian protests began four months ago, the demands made by the demonstrators at the beginning of the protests have now become redundant. While the protests started by demanding basic freedoms, an end to corruption and the legalisation of political parties, these are no longer the demands being made by the Syrian protesters and a large section of the country's opposition. Instead, the overthrow of the regime has become their one and only demand. The demonstrations began in the southern city of Daraa and remained there for the first month of the protests, only taking place on Fridays. The unrest then began to spread to the outskirts of the Syrian capital Damascus, and today it has reached more than 200 towns and cities across Syria, taking place not only on Fridays but every day. Last Friday, more than 1.5 million demonstrators, according to human rights monitors, took to the streets across the country demanding the overthrow of the regime. "The regime is the mechanism that regulates society in all its political, economic, social and cultural aspects," Anwar Al-Bona, a lawyer and director of the Syrian Centre for Legal Studies and Research, told Al-Ahram Weekly. "Since the March 1963 coup, the military has been imposing itself on society, declaring a permanent state of emergency, suspending the constitution, canceling licenses to publish newspapers, creating extraordinary and ad hoc courts, as well as state security courts, and passing laws criminalising anti-revolutionary action, agricultural reform and other things." "It has also stripped the country's judiciary of its independence, bringing it under the authority of the regime, tailored a constitution for its own benefit, dissolved all civil society groups and NGOs except for charities, changed the law governing the country's professional syndicates, making them tools under its control, and also passed other laws giving it absolute power in the country." It is against this background that the current protests have been taking place, with local coordination committees (LCCs) having been set up by the protesters to lead their opposition to the regime. These have set out the conditions that must be met before the protesters will enter into dialogue with the regime, and since the regime has not responded to these, continuing instead to kill unarmed protesters and use the military to crush the demonstrations, the LCCs have announced that they will continue with the protests until the overthrow of the regime. "After the deaths of nearly 2,000 martyrs and with tens of thousands of people arrested, the people will not accept anything less than the overthrow of the regime," declared Razan Zeitouna, a lawyer and activist with the LCCs. "If the regime does not carry out reforms, or makes only cosmetic reforms, it will be ousted under pressure from the street. The regime has tried to loosen its grip in some areas in reaction to foreign pressures, but this has only brought more people out onto the streets with a single demand: the overthrow of the regime," Zeitouna said. Fayez Sara, a member of the executive committee of the Syrian Opposition Coordination Board, believes that the Syrian authorities "are facing the most serious challenge they have ever faced. They are in a political, economic, social and cultural dilemma. The Syrian uprising is now demanding the ousting of the regime, which means that there is no longer room for compromise and there is now a need for the removal of the regime." "The chants of the protesters calling for the ousting of the regime are loud and clear," Sara told the Weekly, "and these are echoed by the opposition and the society. Those in power, led by President Al-Assad, have attempted to handle the situation by tightening their grip, but the current crisis requires a political solution, not only to end the crisis but also to rebuild Syria and the lives of the Syrian people." Three weeks ago, 18 of the country's opposition parties came together to form an umbrella group that outlined specific prerequisites before any dialogue with the regime could be launched. These included the withdrawal of security and military forces from the countries' towns and cities, the release of all political prisoners, and the legalisation of protests until a national conference could be held with the aim of transforming Syria into a pluralist and democratic state. Meanwhile, other Syrian opposition forces have also been demanding the ousting of the regime. The Syrian Conference for Change met in Turkey in early June, and in its final declaration the meeting, attended by the representatives of many of the country's political forces and parties, demanded the resignation of President Bashar Al-Assad and the transfer of power according to the constitution until an interim council could be formed to write a new constitution and prepare for free elections. According to Bashar Al-Eissa, an opposition figure living in exile, the demonstrations sweeping Syria are not merely the actions of individuals or activists, but are part of "political, intellectual and organised dissent" against the regime. "The protesters in Syria want to put an end to the tyranny of the regime," Al-Eissa told the Weekly. "Despite the crimes committed by the regime, the revolution is in control. The youth of the revolution are leading the confrontation using means designed to confuse the authorities and undermine their policies. The day will come when the regime's security structures will collapse." Some opposition figures are also thinking beyond demands to oust the regime and are planning for after its eventual fall. Last Saturday, a National Recovery Conference was held in Istanbul, and this conference, attended by Islamists and liberals, closed ranks behind a single goal: to end the 41-year rule of the Syrian Baath Party. The conference also discussed the period after the end of the regime, calling for the establishment of an interim government staffed by independent figures who would represent all elements in Syrian society. "The conference was based on the demands of the people," Mishaal Al-Tamu, an opposition figure and member of the organising committee of the Istanbul conference, told the Weekly. "After all the blood that has been spilled on the streets, the overthrow of the regime is the demand of the people. Accordingly, it is necessarily for us to discuss the interim phase after the regime falls and to formulate a political alternative to the present regime now that its legitimacy has expired." Walid Al-Bona, a leading figure in the Damascus Declaration for Democratic Change, an opposition group, also believes that the Syrian regime "cannot continue much longer" and that change is imminent. "We must arrive at a united vision of the transitional phase and form an authority composed of all opposition forces," Al-Bona told the Weekly. "We are now laying the foundations for the phase after the present regime falls." According to Al-Eissa, there is "only one way to create a pluralist and democratic state in Syria, which is to convince the regime, willingly or not, that now is the time to hand over power to the state and the state to the people. Preferably this will be done peacefully and through mutual agreement in order to save the country from further losses." Al-Bona, a lawyer who spent five years behind bars for "weakening national sentiment" because he had defended human rights in Syria, believes that changing the regime will require the constitution to be rewritten and a political parties law to be issued to end the ruling Syrian Baath Party's monopoly on power. In addition, the country's judiciary will have to be reorganised, the media freed from the grip of the regime, new election laws passed to ensure free and fair elections, the security services brought under state control and the emergency laws repealed. "The Syrian regime must know that the society, state and nation are now at crisis point, and that the type of regime that holds country, state and society hostage to one political party and one opinion and one person can no longer co-exist with its own people or the international community," Al-Bona said. The Syrian regime "has been clinically dead for years," he added. "The only thing that has been keeping it alive has been the security apparatus."
