The
English Facebook page of the Party of Labour of Iran (Toufan) has interviewed
the comrade in charge of the Office of Foreign Relations of the Party, Comrade
Jaafar Paknia, on the situation in Syria.
The
following is the text of the interview.
Q. Comrade Jaafar, thank you for the time you are spending with us for this
interview. As you know, due to the Russian aerial bombardment and the
destruction of the bases of Daesh (ISIS) and other terrorist groups, the
balance of power has changed in Syria. The regime of Basher Assad has gone on
the offensive, and its forces have advanced significantly. The Turkish
government of Erdogan has violated international norms and regulations and has
frantically bombarded the bases of the Kobane Kurds and has declared its
opposition to any autonomy for the Syrian Kurds. How do you evaluate these new
developments in Syria?
A. The adventurist policy of
Erdogan’s government, a government that is sunk in the dream of the revival of
“Great Ottoman Empire” and that shamelessly interferes in the internal affairs
of the countries of the region has faced disgraceful defeat. This is clearly a
sign of political shortsightedness of the present leadership of Turkey. By
sending the Syrian refugees to Europe, Erdogan wanted to pressure the European
governments to agree with his policy of toppling the legal and legitimate
government of Assad and to pretend that only through NATO involvement in Syria
and its support for terrorist organizations and eventually through the
overthrow of the Syrian government, it is possible to stop the influx of
refugees to Europe. Erdogan’s inhumane conspiracy has become a policy of
instigation, war, and destruction in the region. This policy was rejected by
the European governments, and consequently Turkey’s shortsighted policy faced a
dead end. Erdogan asked for three billion Euros from the European countries as
blackmail to stop the influx of refugees to Europe.
The gains of the Syrian army against Daesh through Russian
bombardment are increasing daily. These gains have encouraged the people in the
Daesh-controlled regions to resist and to participate in the war against the
terrorist organizations. ISIS has chosen the “flight” over “Heaven”. These
terrorists are returning to their homelands by the scores. The
imperialist-trained Daesh and Jihadists have spread their terror campaigns to
their motherlands. Though France has fallen victim to terrorist operations, it
has not stopped interfering in the affairs of the Middle Eastern countries. The
Western imperialist countries that supported Daesh and other terror groups in
killing 300 thousand Syrians will not escape these terror campaigns. Turkey
itself will fall victim to Daesh’s terror campaign soon.
The government of Erdogan that continues the criminal
fascist suppression and bombardment of PKK and the Kurdish people is extremely
frightened by the recent victories of the Syrian government over the terrorist
groups, and it is asking Saudi Arabia and Qatar to jointly dispatch their
armies to Syria to “fight” Daesh. What a joke! What a lie! These countries have
been supporting, training, arming, and financing ISIS for the past five years.
Even Barak Obama and NATO and EU officials are hesitant about the effectiveness
of Erdogan’s adventurist policies. The armed forces of Turkey enter Syria only
for the purpose of destroying the democratic achievements of the Kobane Kurds
and to fight against the Syrian army. This is obviously in violation of the
sovereignty and territorial integrity of Syria.
Q. Some hold the opinion that Russian bombardment of Daesh has made the
situation worse and has killed many civilians, that Russia’s objective in its
rivalry with the U.S. imperialists is to preserve and strengthen its interest
in Syria and the Region, and that Russian interference in the Middle East is an
imperialist act that should not be supported. What is your opinion on these
issues?
A. Before we talk about the
class nature of the Russian establishment, we must clarify the nature of the
war that is being waged in Syria and the Middle East. We must analyze the
reasons why the Western imperialists headed by the U.S. and their lackeys and
allies in the region such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey, etc. want to
overthrow the legal government of Syria. Isn’t this policy of aggression
against Syria consistent with the doctrine of establishing the “Greater Middle
East”? Isn’t this the continuation of the policy of military aggression against
Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, etc.? Isn’t this policy in the interest of Zionism
and world reaction? Do China and Russia desire to disintegrate Syria and split
it into pieces?
It must be emphasized that
Syria has political independence and therefore has the right to freely seek
help from any force or country in order to preserve its national independence
and territorial integrity. This policy of seeking assistance is not new in the
struggle of the people of the world. In the war that is imposed upon Syria, the
condemnation of the Western aggressors and their regional allies must occupy
the first place. These aggressors are seeking the total destruction and
disintegration of Syria. Furthermore, their objective is not limited to the
overthrow of Assad’s regime. The suppression of Lebanon’s resistance movement,
aggression against Iran, and the dispatch of terrorist forces to the borders of
Russia all will come next. The U.S. strategy of “New World Order” is to weaken
and remove the allies of China and Russia, to subdue these two imperialist
rivals, and to impose its hegemony on the globe. The fact is that Eastern
imperialists presently do not have the necessary military power or preparation
to wage war on the Western united military forces of NATO led by the U.S. In
the present condition, it is NATO that has military superiority and violates
and threatens the independence, territorial integrity, and the rights of
nations to self determination. Western imperialism, headed by the U.S., is the
source of all present wars and is responsible for the flight of millions of
people from their homelands in the Middle East, Horn of Africa, Yugoslavia, and
Ukraine.
Russia and China vetoed the
U.S. proposal in the UN Security Council and have expressed many times their
opposition to the bombardment of Syria. This is a positive stand, as were the
stands of Germany and France in opposition to the U.S. invasion of Iraq. It is
clear that behind these stands and oppositions lie economic and political
interests and motives. A political party, while clarifying the nature of the
war and of the forces involved, must adopt its tactic. The independent state of
Syria, as any independent state, can make use of the present world
contradictions to preserve its independence; otherwise, it will not overcome the
aggression imposed on it. One may simplify a complicated political question and
raise a general political slogan and put his mind at ease by declaring war on
all forces involved and then watch the development of the events. This is not
responsible conduct and it is inconsistent with Marxism and Leninist tactics.
Our Party emphasizes that we must defend the independence and territorial
integrity of the countries that face imperialist military aggression. This
defense is a defense for rights of nations to self-determination by their own
people.
We must add that Saudi,
Qatar, and Turkey’s opposition to Syria is over the export of natural gas from
the region to Europe. Iran, Iraq, and Syria planned for a ten-billion-dollar
project for the construction of a pipeline to export Iran’s natural gas to
Europe starting in 2010. In 2012, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed by
these three countries. Two weeks later, armed clashes started in Syria. Armed
terrorist groups were sent to Syria through northern and southern borders.
Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey utilized their means to overthrow the regime of
Assad. Qatar now fights for a bigger share of the market for its natural gas,
and Saudi Arabia and Turkey want the gas pipelines to pass through their
countries in order to become a broker for the export of Qatar’s natural gas to
Europe and to collect transit fees.
Q. Western media
claim that Russian bombardments of Syria have killed many thousands of innocent
people and that Russia is responsible for the continuation of the war and the
migration of hundreds of thousands of residents. What are your views on these
claims?
A. Western media lie about the events in Syria and also
fabricate stories consistent with the official line of their governments. The
Russian fighter jets bomb the bases and positions of Daesh and some other
terrorist groups and have significantly weakened Daesh’s grip on the regions
under their control. Russia displayed satellite pictures of stolen oil tankers
going from Syria to Turkey. Daesh sells the stolen oil to Turkey at a low
price, and Turkey offers it to the world at the market price. Russian jet
fighters bombed many hundreds of these oil tankers.
Assad’s victories over Daesh and over the conspiracies and
plots of the Western imperialists are very bitter for Turkey, Saudi Arabia, the
U.S., and the Western media. These conspirators try to disrupt and hinder the
fight against the terrorists who have destroyed Syria. European countries that
are vulnerable and are threatened by the terrorist actions want to stop their
losses. They see that their policy of toppling the legal government of Assad
has faced defeat and that their hopes are dashed, though they – with the help
from reactionary regimes of the region such as Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey,
and Jordon – made use of everything they could, including the violation of the
UN Charter and of the rights of nations to defeat Assad. Now they are
interested in reduction of tension in the region. They see the reduction of
tension in the region as useful to their interests and to the normalization of
relations with Russia. The government of Erdogan that used Daesh of Arab, Turk,
Turkmen, Chechen, Dagestan, and European nationalities to attack Syria now sees
that the terrorist forces are on the run and are facing defeat followed by
another defeat. Erdogan, with the hope of occupying and annexing northern Syria
to Turkey, has invented a Turkmen national minority in Syria that wants to join
Turkey. Turkmen who are allies of Daesh and who behead Arabs and Kurds are
Erdogan’s brothers and friends and are defended as “non-terrorist” opposition.
The Russian jets are making these terrorists martyrs for Erdogan. And of
course, the jets that make these Turkmen martyrs have to be shut down by the
non-terrorists provided that the U.S. has expressed its consent. With the
defeat of Daesh, the Syrian Kurdish forces are gaining strength, and Erdogan is
losing the hope to split Syria. Obama and Erdogan play a sly and hypocritical
role in the fight against Daesh.
In the present situation, Russians and Assad’s army have
no interest in bombarding the civilian regions. We should mention that long
before the Russian military involvement in Syria, more than 150 thousand
terrorists from 80 countries, financed by Saudi Arabia and Qatar and the U.S.
and Europe, were mobilized to destroy and attack Syria. Now they are defeated
and are on the run. The Western news media tries to instigate public opinion
against the regime of Bashar Assad by engineering lies and distributing photo shopped
pictures.
Q. What is the
future of the regime of President Assad? What stand are the people taking in
this situation?
A. As I have mentioned several times, the U.S. objective
is to overthrow the regime of Assad in the framework of “humanitarian involvement”.
The U.S. imperialists and their allies want to divide Syria into four regions:
a Sunni region in Damascus and its suburbs, the Druze region in the Golan
Heights, the Alavi region in Antakya region, and a Kurdish region in
northeastern Syria. This would make Syria a weak, dependent, and fragmented
country that serves the strategic interest of the U.S. and Israel and their
allies. The silence of the so called human rights organizations on the
violation of the rights of nations by the U.S. imperialists shows the hypocrisy
of the fake human rights organizations.
It must be said that the overthrow of the regime of Bashar
Assad by the hands of the Syrian people led by the working class and for the
purpose of establishing freedom, social justice, and the preservation and
deepening of independence of Syria would be a revolutionary act that serves the
people of Syria and of the entire region. The toppling of the Syrian regime by
the imperialist powers is neither in the interest of the Syrian people nor in
the interest of the people of the region. Parties and organizations that have
not learned from the experience of the occupations of Iraq, Libya, and
Afghanistan and that are still repeating the theories of “fight against all
reactionary forces” and resolving “all social contradictions” at the same time
understand neither tactics nor revolutionary politics. They are sunk in the
Trotskyite quagmire of a “fight against two reactionary poles”. These forces do
not serve the people. On the contrary, they sabotage the national and
liberation struggles of the people against imperialist aggression and invasion.
It is the responsibility of the revolutionary and progressive forces to
resolutely expose these deviated and decaying political currents that damage
the movement under the name of “communist” and “left”.
Today, the Western imperialists see that a significant
section of Syrians, due to the destructive actions of the dark force of Daesh,
have lined up behind Assad’s regime and that not by any means will the Syrian
people “rise up” against the “dictator”. The U.S. imperialists and their allies
are forced to talk about peace (!), but in practice, they beat the war drums on
all fronts.
