Syrian opposition gathers in İstanbul for transitional council

The leading opposition figures met in İstanbul on Saturday, uniting various voices including senior members of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, street protest leaders and prominent Syrian intellectuals, some of whom were imprisoned or sent into exile by the Assad regime due to their ideas challenging the more than 40-year-old Assad regime. “We need to have a roadmap for a transition and unity among the opposition,” Wael Merza, a Syrian political scientist and a participant of the Saturday meeting, was quoted as saying by Reuters. The agency also reported that the conference was different from the previous ones as the Islamist and liberal participants, unlike previous cases, managed to reach broad agreement on the 120 nominees for the transitional council.

Meanwhile, diplomatic sources from Turkish foreign ministry explained on Sunday that the meeting, much like the previous one held in Turkey around three months ago, was an initiative of the Syrian parties and Turkey had nothing to do with the meetings.The absence of unity among the opposition has reportedly been a major concern for Western governments including the United States, with regards to the vacuum that is anticipated to surface if Bashar al-Assad steps down from power.

Syrian opposition representatives previously convened in the Turkish Mediterranean province of Antalya at the end of May to overcome the issues that were keeping the opposition from forming a united front against the Assad regime, which has so far left more than a thousand civilians dead and tens of thousands imprisoned. The Antalya meeting also stirred reactions from a few hundred Syrians who staged a demonstration in support of Assad with banners in front of the hotel that hosted the conference.

Separately on Saturday Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu expressed the belief that contact with Syria would deliver no results for the time being, as he warned the country that reforms which come too late would not be meaningful, given the growing loss of faith on the part of Syrians in Assad.

 “We believed that by giving [the Assad regime] a last chance during my latest visit to Syria, before the international community spoke out, would be a good move,” Davutoğlu told reporters on Saturday from South Africa, where he had talks with the country’s officials as part of a larger Africa tour.

Disappointed by pledges that went unfulfilled by the Syrian regime, the foreign minister recalled that Syria and Turkey had agreed on a roadmap during his visit to Syria, resulting in the withdrawal of tanks in the first two following days, but only to be reverted with more operations and bloodshed as a consequence. “This current condition is not sustainable; the Syrian administration needs to realize that,” Davutoğlu said, adding, “It is not about pressure from the outside; the Syrian administration must make peace with its own people.”

Davutoğlu regarded additional talks with Assad as useless for the time being, saying, “If they do not take the steps necessary after hours of talking, there is nothing to gain from repeated meetings.”

The minister also reiterated Turkey’s expectations from Syria for an immediate halt to operations as well as solid moves on the implementation of reforms, as he stated that if reforms are not implemented shortly, they would lose their meaning. “As these steps keep being postponed and the operations continue, the reforms lose their meaning,” Davutoğlu was quoted as saying by the Anatolia news agency. “The people who stand to benefit from the expected reforms lose their faith in the administration.”

Davutoğlu also announced that despite the absence of contact between the two countries for the moment, the relationship with Syria would not be completely frozen. “Ties with a neighbor can never be completely severed,” the minister told the reporters.