Transcript of Press TV panel discussion of Syrian crisis, 6 December

Transcript submitted by a reader

http://www.urmedium.net/c/presstv/131888
PressTV: 0:01
Iran's foreign minister in a trilateral meeting with his Syrian and Iraqi counterparts says the situation in Syria is a threat to the whole region, which requires regional and international action to resolve it.

Abbas Araghchi: 0:16
The trilateral meeting of the foreign ministers of Iran, Iraq and Syria had three messages. First, a message of support to the nation and government of Syria in their fight against Takfiri terrorist groups, which are carrying out attacks in Syria as part of an American-Israeli conspiracy. Second message is that the threat of terrorism in Syria is a threat to the whole region and resurgence of terrorist groups like Daesh can endanger other regional countries.

Third message is that there should be no discrimination in fighting terrorism and fighting terrorists in Syria is an international obligation. Therefore, countries that are silent regarding the spread of terrorism in Syria are supported, are responsible and must answer why they only fight terrorists where it serves their interests and ignore them at other places.

PressTV: 1:07
Abu Sadaf said Iran believes that to safeguard its own security, it needs to help neighboring countries to safeguard their securities. He said the Islamic Republic will provide whatever assistance it can to the Syrian government The three top diplomats emphasize that their countries will work together to fight the common threat of terrorism They said the armed groups opposing the Syrian government [enjoying] the support of some hostile countries are part of a plot to reshape the map of the region.

For more insight on that story, we're now joined by independent international affairs analyst Gilbert Doctorow, who's joining us from Brussels. We also have journalist, author and activist, Fra Hughes, who's with us from Belfast. Let's start off with Mr. Doctorow in Brussels. Sir, give us your perspective on the violence that's unfolding right now in Syria. And what has led to this point where we are right now?

Doctorow: 2:07
Well I don't think my personal perspective is of particular value to your viewers, but I would like to tell you the perspective coming from Moscow, how they're viewing it, and contrast it with mainstream Western media like the BBC or CNN. The Russians take this new challenge very seriously. They have great interests in Syria, not only to protect what they achieved between 2015 and 2017 when they were very active together with Iran in saving the government of [Bashar Assad] in Damascus.

2:53
What we have now is a great threat to those achievements. If you listen particularly to the BBC and CNN, who are cheerleaders, and they're cheerleaders for good reason: because the United States and the British governments are both evidently heavily involved in this. When it first started, it was common to say among observers in American alternative media that this was an Israeli project because Israel has long had a desire to keep, to maintain chaos in Syria and to thereby interrupt supplies of munitions to Hezbollah that were coming from Iran via Syria. However, it's apparent that there's-- from the Russian standpoint, this was an American project, an American project to weaken Russia and Iran. And Syria is an incidental factor.

3:49
The regime in Damascus is incidental. The fact is that the Russians have an important naval base in Syria, in Tartus. They have an important air base in Khmeimim, in Latakia province. And these are put in jeopardy when you have the cutoff of strategic routes leading to the interior of the country, performed by these HTS rebels. So the Russians have their own interests, both to protect what they achieved at great expense in two years of fighting together with Iran to save the government, and they have a present concern that they not lose the naval base of great importance to them in Eastern Mediterranean, and that they not lose their regional presence in Northeast Africa as a result of the pressure that they're experiencing from the rebels who are otherwise threatening Damascus.

4:55
The cheerleading in Britain is clear on today's BBC. You would hear from them that Homs has virtually fallen. By your own reporting, this is inaccurate. And another factor, another straw in the wind that tells you about the big British presence is the reappearance of something we all should have thought-- we forgot about. That is the white helmets. They're back. The white helmets who were so active in the middle of the Syrian civil war and who were bringing false-flag charges against the Damascus government, saying that it was responsible for chemical attacks and so forth, which were all very nicely staged with British intelligence connivance. The white helmets are back; they are now being reported by BBC for what they're saying about civilian casualties due to bombing in Syria.

5:58
Well, we know who's doing the bombing. It's the Russians and the Syrian air force. So this is anti-government propaganda being spread by the white helmets who are agents of British intelligence. These are the perspectives that I bring to your audience today.

6:15
All right, let's bring in Fra Hughes from Belfast. Mr. Hughes, would you like to add anything to what Mr. Doctorow just mentioned in terms of who is involved with the resurgence of violence and who is to benefit here? And just looking At the trilateral meeting that was held in the Iraqi capital Baghdad, the three foreign ministers of Iran, Iraq, and Syria in a joint press conference said basically that the armed groups opposing the Syrian government, they do enjoy the support of some countries and they're actually part of a plot to reshape the map of the region. Do you see it in that light as well?

Hughes: 6:54
Yes, a hundred percent. I'd like maybe to start off by saying I've actually been in Syria on five different occasions from 2010 up to 2019. And I had the honor to meet President Bashar al-Assad on two occasions. The first thing I maybe want to say is, well, I have to mention Turkey here. I mean, Turkey and the Muslim Brotherhood and everything that's associated through British intelligence have had a long-standing relationship with the Muslim Brotherhood.

They're being used in separate areas across the Levant at times when it suits the intelligence agencies to take someone off the shelf, bring a group onto the battlefield and help destabilise a country where they're looking for regime change. What we're witnessing now is American, British, I'll say EU NATO as well as Israeli plot to destroy the Syrian Arab Republic because it's the only real bulwark of the Arab countries that are standing against in this genocide in Gaza and against the neo-fascist regime in Tel Aviv.

8:05
And I was at a meeting when President Assad told the people in attendance that he was approached before 2011 by the American administration, asking him to basically toe the line to American foreign policy and how this would be in the interests of the Syrian government, the Syrian people, Syrian business and financial institutions. And because he refused to basically bow the knee to Zionism and to condemn and to abandon the people of Palestine and the wider West Asia region, that is why you had this undeclared war on Syria which started in 2011.

8:47
So you have Turkey. There are quite likely to be Turkish special forces involved in these attacks upon Syrian civilians and Syrian towns. It seems to be a pincer movement coming from the south, sorry, the east and the north of Syria. There are many, many disparate groups who may not be politically or ideologically aligned together, but they're fighting in the one cause which is the destruction of the Syrian Arab Republic.

9:18
The reason why Iran and Iraq want to defend Syria, apart from an international obligation, perhaps, to come to the aid of a country suffering from external terrorism that has been imported into the country. They know, as indeed a retired general of the IRGC [Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps] tweeted about six weeks ago, basically that if they're allowed to destroy Gaza on the West Bank and then they're allowed to intimidate and destroy Lebanon, They will then go on to Syria, and then go on to Iraq, and then go on to Iran.

9:52
So you can see that this is an attack on the axis of resistance. This is moving from one faction to another. Israel de facto has a ceasefire with Hezbollah, which means no Hezbollah rockets going into northern occupied Palestine, even though the Israelis continue to break their ceasefire day and day, murdering Lebanese civilians. So the Turks and Erdogan have stuck a knife in the back of the Syrian people.

10:20
And personally, I always believed that the Russians went into Syria apart from the longstanding relationship between the Arab Republic and the Soviet Union. This was to prevent ISIS winning in Syria and then going into Georgia, where we witnessed today another regime change sponsored by the Americans.

PressTV: 10:39
Thanks a lot, gentlemen. We're going to leave it there. Independent international affairs analyst Gilbert Doctorow joining us from Brussels. Thanks to journalist, author and activist, Fra Hughes, speaking to us from Belfast.