Clinton Says Syria’s Assad Has Lost Legitimacy

11 July 2011

Clinton (right) said the Assad regime will not succeed in using attacks on diplomatic facilities to distract the world from the Syrian people's peaceful calls for reform.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton condemned Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime for failing to protect U.S. and French diplomatic facilities in Damascus and said the Syrian leader “has lost legitimacy” because of his violent response to legitimate Syrian aspirations for greater freedom.

Speaking with European Union (EU) High Representative Catherine Ashton at the State Department July 11, Clinton said U.S. officials have spoken with their Syrian counterparts to demand that Syria honor the Vienna Convention, which requires countries to protect foreign diplomats and properties, after several days of attacks by Syrian mobs against U.S. and French facilities.

Clinton said the Assad regime will not succeed in using the attacks on diplomatic facilities to deflect global attention from “the real story unfolding in Syria” and the nearly four months of peaceful protests by its people who have been calling for reforms.

“This is not about America or France or any other country. This is about the legitimate aspirations of the Syrian people for dignity, universal rights and the rule of law,” Clinton said.

The violence, arrests and intimidation against the Syrian people “must stop,” the secretary said, and neither they nor the international community will accept “half measures or lofty speeches” from the Assad regime.

Assad “is not indispensable” and the United States has “absolutely nothing invested in him remaining in power,” she said. “Our goal is to see that the will of the Syrian people for a democratic transformation occurs.”

The Syrian leader “has failed to deliver on the promises he’s made. He has sought and accepted aid from the Iranians as to how to repress his own people,” Clinton said. She called on more countries in the international community to speak out “as forcefully as we have.”

Ashton said the EU is trying to use its collective political and economic power to get Assad to turn away from violence. She described the situation of Syrian refugees who have fled the unrest for Turkey as “very grave indeed.” Their accounts reflect information that international news media, which have been unable to report from inside Syria, have been receiving.

The EU representative called for an end to the violence, for the Syrian people to have their voices heard, and for them to then be allowed to make the decisions about how their country should move forward.