MOSCOW. (RIA Novosti political commentator Marianna Belenkaya.) A long diplomatic campaign to establish the degree of Syria's involvement in the murder of Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic Hariri on February 14, 2005, and to decide on the punishment for the culprits, has begun.
The situation is reminiscent of the UN Security Council's treatment of Iraq three years ago. The solution of the Syrian problem will show if the international community has learned its lessons from the Iraqi collision.
The charges brought against Syria were based on a report by the international independent investigation commission headed by Detlev Mehlis, which spent several months looking into the assassination of Hariri. Their conclusion is that the crime could not have been perpetrated without the approval of high-ranking officials of Syrian security-related structures and their collusion with Lebanese colleagues. The investigators also said that the inquiry was not over and had to be continued.
Members of the UN Security Council agree, but this does not stop many of them from passing judgment on Syria.
Immediately following the publication of the report, U.K. Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said that the Security Council might consider imposing international sanctions against Syria. U.S. Ambassador to the UN John Bolton said Washington did not rule out sanctions either. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice suggested creating an international mechanism for calling Syrian officials to account.
It takes the agreement of all permanent members of the UN Security Council to approve international sanctions, but Russia and China are not ready to vote on the issue. Other council members may wait until the end of the investigation provided Syria fully cooperates with the Mehlis commission. Syria is ready to comply, but only if the investigation does not turn into a political circus where Syrians will be proclaimed guilty regardless of their testimony. But who is to determine the level of Damascus's cooperation and how?
According to RIA Novosti's sources, Detlev Mehlis said in Syria a month before the publication of the report that he had no proof of Syria's guilt and was satisfied with his contacts with Damascus. Yet the report expresses disappointment over the scale of Syrian authorities' cooperation with the commission.
This reminds me of the long debates in the UN Security Council over the validity of Iraq's claim that it was no longer producing weapons of mass destruction. As we know now, Iraq was right and the world was proved wrong on that count.
The issue of sanctions against Syria is still on the agenda, but the example of Iraq highlighted the ineffectiveness of the sanction mechanism. The sanctions imposed against various countries in the past were invariably rooted in the intention not only to force regimes into cooperation on certain issues but also to destroy them from within. Libya is the only successful example of sanctions, while in all other cases the sanctions regime either collapsed or failed to serve its purpose.
On the other hand, I am not sure that sanctions forced Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi to terminate his weapons of mass destruction programs. Gaddafi's decision was preceded by extended secret talks between Tripoli, Washington and London. For years the United States kept secret its plan of replacing the Gaddafi regime, unlike the plans regarding Baghdad and Pyongyang and the recent intentions regarding Damascus and Tehran.
Therefore, Libya's example (like the recent events around North Korea's nuclear programs) is another proof that a reasonable dialogue with due account of pragmatic interests is much more effective than sanctions and accusations, even when they are justified.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told journalists in mid-October, "Sanctions are ineffective as an instrument of attaining foreign policy goals." Russia prefers other methods, he said, such as reaching a compromise. The issue under discussion was not Syria but the essence of the statement applies to it equally.
It is also uncertain how effective an international tribunal would be at prosecuting members of Syrian and Lebanese security-related services if Damascus and Beirut extradite them. I doubt it would be, judging by the trial of the former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic.
The international community is facing a challenging task, which can create a precedent of a reasonable solution of such problems. To begin with, we need to understand the goals of those who have initiated charges against Syria. Do they want to find the assassins or change the Syrian regime? The answer to this question would clarify the situation.
Russian experts believe that the pressure Europe and America are putting on Syria is convenient for the Syrian president, Bashar Assad, helping him carry out reforms. This may be a smart diplomatic game, and it may be that nobody is interested in changing the Damascus regime. In fact, the West does not have the means and resources for this, considering the situation in Iraq and the rest of the region. But, even though it lacks resources, I doubt that the U.S. will have the wisdom to act prudently.
What is doubtless is that destabilization in Syria will be far more destructive for the entire region than the Iraqi crisis.
