Bashar al-Assad ‘detached from reality,’ says US

The US has rejected Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s fresh proposal to end the civil war in his country, asserting his new road map is “detached from reality.”

“Bashar al-Assad’s speech today is yet another attempt by the regime to cling to power and does nothing to advance the Syrian people’s goal of a political transition. His initiative is detached from reality, undermines the efforts of Joint Special Representative Lakhdar Brahimi, and would only allow the regime to further perpetuate its bloody oppression of the Syrian people,” State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland said.

“For nearly two years, the Assad regime has brutalised its own people. Even today, as Assad speaks of dialogue, the regime is deliberately stoking sectarian tensions and continuing to kill its own people by attacking Sunni towns and villages in the mixed areas of Jabal Akrad and Jabal Turkmen in Lattakia province,” she alleged.

Reiterating that Assad has lost all legitimacy, the US demanded that he must step aside to enable a political solution and a democratic transition that meets the aspirations of the Syrian people.

“The US continues to support the Geneva Action Group’s framework for a political solution, which was endorsed by the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, the Arab League, and the UN General Assembly. We will continue our efforts in support of Joint Special Representative Brahimi to build international unity behind it and to urge all parties in Syria to take meaningful steps toward its implementation,” Nuland said.

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