‘SEATED amongst us today in this room, are representatives of countries that have the blood of Syrians on their hands, countries that have exported terrorism along with clemency for the perpetrators.’
This is what Syrian Deputy Premier, Foreign and Expatriates Minister, Walid al-Moallem told the opening session of the Geneva Conference yesterday.
He refused to cut short his defiant opening speech at the Geneva 2 summit despite being harassed by UN Secretary Ban Ki-moon.
Attacking the Gulf region allies of imperialism participating in the conference Moallem condemned the, ‘Countries that are financing and supporting terrorists. . . that have become accustomed to being entirely owned by kings and princes who have the sole right to distribute their national wealth granting their associates whilst denying those who fall out of favour.’
‘They lectured Syria’ he said, ‘a distinguished, virtuous, sovereign state, they lectured her on honour whilst they themselves were immersed in the mud of enslavement, infanticide and other medieval practices.
He continued: ‘After all their efforts and subsequent failures, their masks fell from their quivering faces, to reveal their perverse ambitions.
‘A desire to destabilise and destroy Syria by exporting their national product: terrorism.
‘They used their petrodollars to buy weapons, recruit mercenaries and saturate airtime covering up their mindless brutality with lies under the guise of the so-called Syrian revolution that will fulfil the aspirations of the Syrian people.’
Moallem began his address saying: ‘Never have I been in a more difficult position; my delegation and I carry the weight of three years of hardship endured by my fellow countrymen – the blood of our martyrs, the tears of our bereaved, the anguish of families waiting for news of a loved one – kidnapped or missing, the cries of our children whose tender fingers were the targets of mortar shelling into their classrooms.
‘My delegation and I also carry the hope of a nation for the years to come – the right of every child to safely go to school again, the right of women to leave their homes without fear of being kidnapped, killed or raped; the dream of our youth to fulfil their vast potential; the return of security so that every man can leave his family safe in the knowledge that he will return.’
He rubbished the notion that foreign-backed insurgents had the Syrian people’s interests at heart, saying: ‘How can Chechen, Afghan, Saudi, Turkish or even French and English terrorists deliver on the aspirations of the Syrian people, and with what?’
He condemned the propaganda that the terrorists were revolutionaries saying: ‘Under the pretext of the “Great Syrian Revolution,” civilians, clergymen, women and children are killed, victims are indiscriminately blown up in streets and buildings regardless of their political views or ideologies; books and libraries are burned, graves are dug up and artifacts stolen.’
This he said was, ‘what their masters ordered them to do, these countries that spearheaded the war against Syria, trying to increase their influence in the region with bribes and money, exporting human monsters fully soaked in abhorrent Wahabi ideology, all at the expense of Syrian blood.
‘From this stage, loud and clear, you know as well as I do that they will not stop in Syria, even if some sitting in this room refuse to acknowledge or consider themselves immune.
‘Clearly, oblivious to the fact that magic eventually turns on the magician, it is now beginning to taste the sour seed it has sown.
‘For terrorism knows no religion, and is loyal only unto itself.’
He concluded saying: ‘Let it be clear to all that nobody has the authority to grant or withdraw legitimacy from a president, a government, a constitution, a law or anything else in Syria except Syrians themselves; this is their constitutional right and duty.
‘Syrians alone have the right to choose their government, their parliament and their constitution; everything else is just talk and has no significance.’