An interesting report of the former ambassador of India in Damascus makes clear: The claim of the west, that the Syrian president Assad was to be brought down by a national uprising, is not lasting. The war was instigated from the outside, most of all, by the golf states and Al Qaeda. The
USA via the Al Nusra wing worked together with Al Qaeda. Assad had underestimated the danger - because he knew that his people stand behind him.


V.P.Haran served from 2009 to 2012 as an ambassador of India in Syria. He has spoken of how parts of the media have blown out of proportion the uprising and about sign for the fact that al-Qaeda since the early days of the conflict was a major player). The understanding of the ambassador confirms that of the US journalist Seymour Hersch; that Assad had to fear no militant opposition within his own people.

How was Syria when you arrived in January, 2009?

V.P.Haran:
Syria was a peaceful country and there were no underlying tensions. Of the Syrian economy it went well and the average growth rate lay at more than 5 percent. Unemployment lay at approximately 8 percent, however, jobless Syrians could find work in the golf states. Nevertheless, there was a high rate to educated unemployed person. Syria was also in a comfortable position concerning from foreign debts at 12.5 percent of the GDP. A large part of it was owed Russia which erased many of the debts.
The real problem was the dryness in the north-east which had led to a massive resettlement in the south and the southwest.

How was life in Damascus?

V.P.Haran:
As a diplomat one inclines to lead a secluded life, however, sometimes I went in the city centre, sometimes with the taxi, drank a tea in the café and spoke with the people. These were wonderful moments and wonderful days. The public order never was a problem. My female colleagues told me, they could carry jewellery and run at two o'clock in the morning home and feel safe. In some
parts of town restaurants had opened till five o'clock in the morning. One never had the feeling that there would be annoyance on the streets. Some say, this would be owed to the Muchabarat (military Secret Service), however, I felt that the people themselves felt responsible for their collective security.

When I arrived in Damascus, it was said me that every second Syrian would be part of the Muchabarat. This is a vast overestimation. There is a Secret Service department and she functions very efficiently, but for me there never was a direct meeting. During my four years of service I was pursued once {in the media} in the Idlib province. A jeep has held on to us, but it was not daunting.

Have you foreseen the Arabian spring in Syria?

V.P.Haran:
When the situation tensed up in Tunisia and Egypt, president Bashar al-Assad gave a TV appearance in which he demonstrated, that there are very different political and economic conditions in Syria. He said, he is confident that Syria would not go the same way. This was also the general appraisal of the diplomatic community.

Bashar al-Assad was a popular leader and this contributes partly also to the fact that he still is in power. There is no adequate internal opposition and many of the problems in Syria come from foreign sources, which try to rid themselves of an inconvenient regime. 67 percent of the whole Arabian world had chosen him in a survey in 2009 the most popular Arabian person. Even the diplomatic community agreed about the fact that he had the support of approximately 80 percent of Syria. Also western diplomats said this. He had begun in 2000 reforms which he did not carry out, however, because of the opposition by the Baath party.

Also this is not simply a fight between Sunnites and Schiites. Look at the figures. There are more than 50 percent sunnitische Muslims in Syria. And there are Kurds, Druse, Maronites, Assyrians, Alawites and others who make up for the rest. Bashar al-Assad even a big portion of the sunnitischen Muslims has supported him and he enjoyed the full support of these minorities. However, up to the time when I left in 2012, Syria had changed very much. While the first couple of years were like in heaven, things got worse early in 2011.

Do you remember the first protests?

V.P.Haran:
From February, as Bahrain experienced protests, there were attempts of some NGOs to organise protests in Damascus. Two were organised over the course of two week-ends, however, just
20 or 30 people took part. The number of the journalists and members of the diplomatic community was by far bigger than those of the demonstrators. Then the 18th of March, 2011 occurred, as children wrote to the walls of the school and then there was a big protest. In the next week there was another protest in Latakia and then with every next Friday something happened.

Soon it was chaotic in parts of Latakia, Homs and Hama, however, Aleppo remained quiet which
disturbed the opposition very much. The opposition could not make the people of Aleppo get up against the regime, so they sent busloads of full people to Aleppo. Then these people burnt something on the streets and left again. Then journalists reported about it and said, Aleppo had rebelled.

A few things must be said about it: some parts of the media have exaggerated it in their negative representations of Syria. Sometimes it was reported about things which have not happened. For example, I spoke with a prominent sheikh when my colleagues called me completely stressed and meant, the sheikh would play a role in protests, that were planned for the afternoon. But that could not be the case at all. Since I sat at the very moment with him having lunch. There was an
enormous amount of exaggerations by the media.

There is one incident that stuck out. A group of hard-core Sunniten of Idlib had gone to Aleppo
and had persuaded people to join the opposition. People in Aleppo caught them and assaulted them and chased them back home. The mass had become uncontrollable and the police had to come and bring them under control. The Sunniten from Idlib had to be brought in a house and the
police had to give them her uniforms, so that they could go without being lynched.

Did Damascus change very much in this time?

V.P.Haran:
I can remember to an incident on the 14th of April when I undertook my everyday walk to the stadium which was located approximately two kilometres away. On the way I went past the bakers to which I always went, however, there was a long queue before the usually quiet baker. On the way back, the queue was there still and I asked. The people stocked up with bread, because they had heard that something would happen. The next day nothing happened, although it was Friday.

When the situation worsened, I substituted my walk to the stagdium in the second half of 2012 with one all around the park in the Mezzeh district. One day there came a motorcycle at high speed and turned on a corner from where it revved up the engine. Short time later a jeep of the security people went past, however, it missed the turn which the motorcycle had taken. After they could not find the motorcycle, they came to the park and asked the people whether they had seen what had happened. Then we were told that the people on the motorcycle had planned attacks.

In Mezzeh, not far from the district in which the diplomats live, there is a cactus field, and rebels had penetrated the area by a tunnel and set up a camp from which they fired rockets at the office of the prime minister. Then the security forces arrived and destroyed the camp. This was a
specific operation and I spoke with somebody who had a flat with clear view, and he said to me that they had taken a building in the visor and had completely destroyed it. A gigantic confidential camp with weapons and ammunition was recovered from the building.

However, parts of the country remained quiet.

The external supporters of the opposition could not digest this. They sent a group of people to the Syrian-Jordanian border where they overran two security posts. They killed all people there. Some of them were killed in the cruelest Al Qaeda manner. The government did not announce this immediately, however, a member of the diplomatic community confirmed that it had been al-Qaeda from Iraq. It was evident that al-Qaeda from Iraq were present in Syria since April, 2011.

Al-Qaeda was there from the first week, or since end of 2011, as Al Qaeda flags. These were these groups which supplied the opposition with support from outside of the borders. In Raqqa the fighters came from the north and it was clear that it was al-Qaeda.

Assad from the outset said over and over again, that these were terrorists. Why has nobody believed him?

V.P.Haran:
The heads of the people were not open. What interest should al-Qaeda in Iraq have, to create chaos in Syria? A lot of it was steered by outsiders, namely the gulf states. Al Jazeera has also played a role. In April I had led a guest to the amphitheatre in Bosra and afterwards to Sweida for which I had to take the highway to the Jordanian border. On this day an Al Jazeera correspondent was asked to leave Syria and he travelled on the same street. The correspondent reported about checkpoints, every few seconds. My embassy called me in panic, because of that what they had seen on television. I told them, I had found only one checkpoint.

Why did the Syrian government deliver no better arguments to confirm the presence of
terrorists?

V.P.Haran:
We confronted them for the lack of open discussion with the media and they said, nobody believed them. They had very bad PR and use of the media. On the other hand, there were also excesses by the government. Syria has very immoderate police forces. When the problems started, the government was made to put security forces to take care of problems which are otherwise handled by the police. Some in the army also committed excesses and the government had to put some of them under house arrest or in prison, however, they did not publicise this.

Bashar al-Assad was not only slow in his reforms but also slow in announcing changes which were made. When, for example, the reform which reduced the priority position of the Baath party, was reported only after three months. Their PR was not wise. They have not managed the crisis well.