Syria Manaf Tlas defection 'hard blow' for Assad
A Syrian general close to President Assad has defected,
delivering "a hard blow for the regime", French Foreign
Minister Laurent Fabius has said.
Brig Gen Manaf Tlas fled Syria via Turkey, his family confirmed.
Mr Fabius said his departure showed Mr Assad's entourage
was realising the regime was unsustainable. US Secretary
of State Hillary Clinton spoke of "insiders voting with their feet".
If confirmed, it would be the highest-level defection since the
unrest began.
Pro-government website Syriasteps said earlier Gen Tlas had
made an "escape", adding the move was "insignificant".
Gen Tlas, believed to be in his mid-40s, is a commander of a
unit of the elite Republican Guard. As a young man he attended
military training with President Assad.
Speaking after a Friends of Syria meeting in Paris, Mr Fabius described him as a "personality who belongs to the Republican Guard of Bashar al-Assad and was for a long time was one of his friends and close to him".
"Even those close to Assad have begun to understand that one
cannot support a slaughterer like Bashar al-Assad."
Initially, Mr Fabius said the general was on his way to Paris
but later added he had no indication of his final destination.
The general's father, former Defence Minister Mustafa Tlas,
reportedly lives in France.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, also at the Paris meeting,
said that if the "increasing stream of senior military defectors"
was any indication, then "regime insiders and the military
establishment were starting to vote with their feet".
The violence continued on Friday, when Syrian forces
captured the northern city of Khan Sheikhoun from rebels.
Activists said 25 people were killed.
With the UN observer mission's mandate in Syria due to
expire in two weeks, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon
called on the Security Council to reduce its size and shift
its focus from monitoring to political mediation.
The BBC's Barbara Plett, at the UN in New York, says by
changing the focus of the mission rather than withdrawing
it, the UN would be sending the message that the international
community is not abandoning Syria.
'Good sign'Although Gen Tlas's intentions are not yet clear, Amer
al-Sadeq, a member of a Damascus-based opposition
group, described the latest development as "a good sign".
"Defecting soldiers, we see many of them, defecting officers,
the more they come the better it is to make the regime weaker
," Mr Sadeq told the BBC.
Gen Tlas has been under a form of house arrest since May
2011 because he opposed the security solution that the regime
has been implementing, sources say.
Unlike most of Syria's leaders, who are Alawites, Gen
Tlas is a Sunni Muslim.He was also the first government
official to meet the opposition last year to try to start a dialogue
and find a political solution to the 16-month crisis.
Syria's majority Sunni community has been at the forefront of
the revolt against the president and has borne the brunt of the
state's crackdown.
But the Tlas family has given support to the Assad family for
decades, helping to ensure Bashar al-Assad's succession to
the presidency 12 years ago.
'Legitimate aspirations'News of his desertion coincided with a Friends of Syria
conference in Paris where 107 countries called for tougher
sanctions on Damascus.
Mr Annan's six-point plan under an article of Chapter 7 of
the UN Charter that refers to economic, diplomatic, travel and
communication measures.
Russia and China, which did not attend the meeting, both hold
vetoes in the Security Council.
Mrs Clinton urged the representatives to persuade Russia and
China "get off the sidelines" and end their support for the Syrian
regime.
Moscow rejected her remarks as "inappropriate".
The Paris meeting followed similar events in Tunis and Istanbul which demanded tougher action against the Assad regime.
UN diplomats are working on a document calling for restrictions
on commercial activity if Mr Assad fails to abide by UN and Arab
League envoy Kofi Annan's ceasefire plan and roadmap for a
political transition.
The roadmap - announced last weekend by Annan after a meeting
of world powers in Geneva - includes an interim government to
enable the Syrian people to live ''independently and democratically''.
Western powers believe that Mr Assad should play no part in
Syria's future, but the roadmap allows Mr Assad an effective
veto over any interim candidate he opposes.
Some 15,800 people have died in more than a year of violence in
Syria, activists say.
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