Syria refuses to ‘bow’ to US sanctions

DAMASCUS: Syria refuses to "bow" to Washington´s demands under the latest US sanctions, Foreign Minister Walid Muallem said Tuesday, charging that the sole aim was to undermine support for President Bashar al-Assad.

"If they (Washington) dreamt that Syria and its people would bow to their conditions, then I would say let them keep dreaming because this will never happen," Muallem told a news conference in Damascus, nearly a week after the Caesar Act came into force. The sanctions laid down in the law, according to US officials, aim to force Assad to accept UN Security Council Resolution 2254 of 2015 that calls for a ceasefire, elections and political transition in Syria.

But the real objective is "to influence upcoming presidential elections" in Syria scheduled for next year, Muallem said, and weaken support for Assad ahead of polling. "President Assad will remain as long as the Syrian people want him to," the foreign minister stressed.

The Caesar Act, which took effect last Wednesday, punishes under US law any company that works with Assad, casting a cloud over efforts to rebuild Syria. It seeks to prevent any normalisation with Assad´s regime without accountability for human rights abuses, and also blocks US reconstruction assistance.

The first designations target 39 people or entities, including Assad and his wife Asma -- the first time she has been slapped with US sanctions. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called the sanctions "the beginning of what will be a sustained campaign of economic and political pressure to deny the Assad regime revenue and support it uses to wage war and commit mass atrocities against the Syrian people".

Muallem said such comments were part of a "chorus of lies", arguing that "those seeking the interests of the Syrian people wouldn´t conspire against their livelihoods".