Assad question open at Syria conference

Associated Press

GENEVA

An international conference Saturday accepted a U.N.-brokered peace plan that calls for the creation of a transitional government in Syria, but at Russia’s insistence the compromise agreement left the door open to Syria’s president being part of it.

The U.S. backed away from insisting that the plan should explicitly call for President Bashar Assad to have no role in a new Syrian government, hoping the concession would encourage Russia to put pressure on its longtime ally to end the violence that the opposition says has claimed more than 14,000 lives.

But even with Russia’s most explicit statement of support yet for a political transition in Syria, it is far from certain that the plan will have any real effect in curbing the violence. A key phrase in the agreement requires that the transitional governing body “shall be formed on the basis of mutual consent,” effectively giving the present government and the opposition veto power over each other.

Opposition figures rejected any notion of sharing in a transition with Assad.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton insisted Saturday that Assad would still have to go, saying it is “incumbent on Russia and China to show Assad the writing on the wall and help force his departure.”