Arab League News - The New York Times #Syria #Assad #Fail

Arab League News - The New York Times
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On Nov. 12, the league voted to suspend Syria’s membership, accusing Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad of defying an agreement to stop the violent repression of demonstrators, and it threatened economic and political sanctions if he did not comply.

The league then made a move on Nov. 16 that seemed to counter its decision to suspend Syria, offering to send civilian and military monitors to Syria to determine whether it was abiding by the league-brokered peace plan. In a meeting of foreign ministers in Rabat, Morocco, the league offered Syria a new deadline of three days to accept the plan. The move effectively delayed Syria’s suspension, suggesting that the league still believed its plan was viable, despite a death toll in November that activists put at nearly 400.

The reprieve was for naught. On November 24, in a humiliating affront for the Syrian government, the Arab League called on Syria to agree to admit international monitors within 24 hours or face economic sanctions, while activists reported new clashes between army troops and defectors.

The league called on Syria to admit a mission of 500 civilian and military observers to monitor the human rights situation and oversee efforts to carry out the peace plan that Syria agreed to on Nov. 2. The league suspended Syria after it failed to comply with the plan.

The announcement came after the European Union said that safeguarding civilians had become a priority. As of late November, the death toll exceeded 3,500, according to the United Nations.

On Nov. 27, the Arab League imposed economic sanctions on Syria that included a travel ban against scores of senior officials, a freeze on Syrian government assets in Arab countries, a ban on transactions with Syria’s central bank and an end to all commercial exchanges with the Syrian government. The Syrian foreign minister, Walid al-Moallem, responded by denouncing the sanctions as “economic war”, and hinted at retaliation.

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