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Europeans step toward easing Syria oil exports

 
The New York Times
April 17, 2013
James Kanter and Rick Gladstone
 
European Union members reached a preliminary agreement on Wednesday that would ease an embargo on oil exports from Syria, diplomats said, part of an effort to enable opposition-held areas with petroleum resources to develop an economic base and some self-sufficiency.
 
Such an agreement, if carried out as intended, would be the West's first relaxation of the increasingly painful economic sanctions imposed on Syria since President Bashar al-Assad's tough repression of political dissent two years ago, which has since evolved into a civil war. The relaxation would also represent the first Western move to create economic incentives for residents in insurgent-held areas, largely in the north and east where many of Syria's oil field facilities are. Those residents now have little or no means to support themselves.
 
Word of the preliminary agreement came as new bouts of deadly fighting were reported in Syria, where the government was celebrating its Independence Day holiday honoring the end of French occupation in 1946. Mr. Assad used the occasion to excoriate his Western and Arab adversaries on television for what he called their conspiratorial attempts to subjugate Syria by supporting the insurgents, and insisted that the country would collapse if they won.
 
"There is no option but victory," he said. "Otherwise it will be the end of Syria, and I don't think that the Syrian people will allow such an option."
 
Syria is a minor oil producer, accounting for less than 1 percent of global output, but petroleum has been a vital export component. Europe was the main buyer until the embargo was imposed in 2011. Although the embargo and other sanctions were meant to pressure Mr. Assad into political compromise, he has been recalcitrant but the effects have devastated Syria's economy. A report in Syria's pro-government Al-Watan newspaper on April 7 said Syrian exports basically collapsed in 2012, to $185 million compared with $7.2 billion in 2011.
 
Some Syria experts say the sanctions, combined with the effects of the war, have done more harm than good. More than 1.2 million Syrians have fled to refugee camps in neighboring countries, and millions more are displaced or in urgent need of food and other basics. The United Nations relief agencies, in an unusual joint appeal on Tuesday, said they would soon be unable to cope with the crisis.
 
"Sanctions are important, because the Syrian economy has gone into free fall, and the refugee outflow is being driven both by insecurity as well as increasingly by poverty and lack of food," said Joshua M. Landis, director of the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma and author of the Syria Comment blog, which has tracked the conflict.
 
"Jump-starting the economy is key to keeping Syrians inside Syria and out of refugee camps," Mr. Landis said. "The West says it is targeting the regime, but one can easily see that the regime is feeding its troops and the people are starving."
 
Questions remain about how the European Union's preliminary agreement to ease the oil embargo, reached by representatives of member states meeting in Brussels, would help the opposition and keep the revenue out of Mr. Assad's hands.
 
A more senior group of European Union officials was expected to further consider the agreement on Thursday before a meeting Monday of European Union foreign ministers, who could endorse it. Even with foreign ministers' approval, legislative steps may be required to ease the embargo. European Union heads of government could take the final decision on May 22 when they meet in Brussels for their next scheduled summit meeting.
 
As part of the agreement Wednesday, each member state seeking to buy oil from Syria or to supply the Syrian industry with equipment must follow a strict procedure that has yet to be completed. But one thing was clear: The National Coalition of Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces, Syria's main political opposition group, would need to be "consulted in advance by the member state concerned," said a European diplomat reading from a copy of the agreement. The diplomat asked not to be identified because the agreement was still subject to ministerial approval.
 
Fighting on Wednesday appeared to be most violent in the central and northwest parts of Syria, anti-Assad activists reported. In the village of Buwaydah outside the city of Homs, a military-fired rocket killed at least 12 people, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, the Britain-based group with a network of contacts inside Syria. Several videos depicting grief-stricken survivors of the attack were posted on YouTube.
 
Outside the city of Aleppo near the Turkish border, the Local Coordination Committees, another anti-Assad group, said the Syrian military had fired Scud missiles, including at least one during Mr. Assad's broadcast interview, that hit the town of Azaz, leaving dozens dead and wounded. There was no way to corroborate the assertions.
 
Clashes were also reported in the Damascus suburb of Jobar and other areas, including the airport, where the coordination committees and some activists reached by phone said the government had used chemical weapons, an accusation both sides have made against each other before. None have been verified.
 
At the United Nations, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said at a news conference Wednesday that Syria's government had still not granted permission for a team of forensic experts to enter the country to investigate claims of chemical weapons use that were made nearly a month ago.
 
"The team of experts is ready to deploy quickly as soon as we have the Syrian government's consent," Mr. Ban said.
 
It remained unclear why the government, which had requested the investigation, was not ready to proceed.
 
Mr. Assad said nothing about the chemical weapons claims and counterclaims in his televised interview, in which he sought to portray the war as a creation of the Western powers and their Arab allies who are financing the armed opposition. Again and again, he described Europe and the United States as conspiratorial and colonialist-minded in their attempts to topple him. He also accused them of cynically supporting the entry of jihadist insurgent fighters, including members of Al Qaeda, into Syria.
 
"The West always exploits any element that surfaces even if they are against that element," he said. "It's a double standard. They combat them in Mali and then back them in Syria. They use any card they have. If those groups come to Syria, it lessens some of the pressure on Americans in other areas. Moreover, it also destroys Syria. And this is what the West wants and why they back such groups."
 
Mr. Assad also said, "The West doesn't know that this terrorism they're backing now is going back to them, and they will pay the price for it in the heart of Europe and in the heart of the West."
 
James Kanter reported from Brussels, and Rick Gladstone from New York. Hania Mourtada and Hwaida Saad contributed reporting from Beirut, Lebanon, and Hala Droubi from Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
 
© 2013 The New York Times Company
 
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