"There is a point at which non-interference becomes complicity in mass murder."
The Middle East is undergoing a historic transformation. Parts of the region are up in flames, and Asia's primary powers either have no role or a destructive one. Pakistan, Indonesia and other Asian Muslim countries, as well as India, with the world's second-largest Muslim population, are largely uninvolved, as if events in the region have no bearing on them. Japan is preoccupied with its own domestic difficulties. Russia and China consistently support the "bad guys" and in the process are both undermining regional developments and harming their own long-term interests in the region.
In Syria, a heinous dictatorship, one of the world's worst, desperately fighting for its survival, is killing tens of thousands of its own citizens. While the Western reaction has been fainthearted, Russia and China have been outright obstructionist, blocking any effective measures in the Security Council or elsewhere.
Indeed, Russia, as in many other cases, such as the international intervention in Libya, appears far more intent on pursuing its own misguided crusade to stymie American influence around the world, than in resolving the issue. Russia is interested in preserving its one remaining foreign naval port, in Tartus, Syria, and Damascus remains one of the few remaining clients for Russian arms. Russia's support for the regime, however, along with Iran and Hezbollah, places it among Syria’s few remaining friends, hardly a prestigious club, and has already likely begun turning Arab opinion against it. With the Syrian regime's demise most probably simply a matter of time, and an Arab world in which citizens are increasingly empowered and determined to settle accounts with their malefactors, Russia's standing in the region will likely be undermined considerably. Signs are already apparent.
China, as part of its traditional reluctance to intervene in the internal affairs of foreign countries, has been less directly involved, but it, too, will be remembered poorly by the people in the region for its negative role in the Security Council. There is a point at which non-interference becomes complicity in mass murder.
Photo Credit: Office of the President: Russian Federation
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CYXOB
What glasses are on author's eyes? His black is white, but what is white he see as black. Very similar to Andre Glucksmann russophobe eyeglasses.
Amar
Bravo Jacques- You have hit the proverbial nail on the head. Syria and Iran amongst others are the manifestations of greater power games currently being played. China and to an extent Russia would do their utmost to delay and disrupt America's so called pivot to Asia-Pacific. Continuing engagement and distractions in what is the Greater Middle East is the instant fix in this strategy.
Bankotsu
What is the point of these obvious western propaganda hit pieces exactly?
It is quite sickening to read such nonsensical propaganda articles. Give me factual analysis, not garbage western propaganda filth.