Syria ‘being destroyed’ warns UN envoy as mass grave found

The UN Security Council has been divided over Syria for months, with the United States, Britain, France and other Western powers backing the armed opposition and pushing for resolutions that raised the threat of sanctions. Three times, however, Russia and China have cast vetoes to block those resolutions.

“I’m embarrassed to be repeating the same thing: Syria is being destroyed,” Lakhdar Brahimi, the joint UN-Arab League envoy to Syria, said after closed-door consultations with the security council.

Mr Brahimi blamed both Syrian president Bashar Assad’s government and the Western-backed opposition forces.

“Objectively, they are co-operating to destroy Syria. Syria is being destroyed bit by bit. And in destroying Syria, the region is being pushed into a situation that is extremely bad, and extremely important for the entire world,” he said.

Mr Brahimi suggested the security council revisit the Geneva Communique of June 2012, a broad but ambiguous proposal endorsed by the Western powers and Russia to provide a basis for negotiations.

Assad’s role in any transition government was left vague and the United States and Russia continue to disagree, though both signed off on the communique.

Mr Brahimi says the security council should now look toward the provisions of the Geneva Communique as a solution.

“A very critical element is the creation of this governing body, which is really a transition government, with full executive powers,” he said.

“I think there was a very clever creative ambiguity in this creation, but I told them that ambiguity has to be lifted now. Now you have to say what those full executive powers would be. All the powers of state have got to go to that government,” he told reporters.

Without a council push on the Assad government and opposition, the Geneva Communique and his mediation “cannot be implemented as it is”, he said.

Mr Brahimi addressed widespread rumours that he was about to quit, as his predecessor, former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan, did last year.

“Am I going to resign? I am not a quitter,” Mr Brahimi said. “The United Nations has no choice but to remain engaged with this problem, whether I am there or not. The moment I feel I am totally useless, I will not stay one minute more.

“So if I’m doing it, it is because, maybe stupidly, I feel a sense of duty.”

His warnings came as officials sought to identify the bodies of at least 65 people, some with hands hands tied behind their backs, that have been found in Syria’s northern city of Aleppo.

The bodies, almost all of men in their 20s and 30s, were discovered in the contested neighbourhood of Bustan al-Qasr.

Intense clashes between rebels and government troops have raged in the district since opposition forces launched an offensive on Aleppo in July.

A rebel spokesman said the identities of the dead were unknown, and it was not clear who was behind the killings or when they occurred.

A government official said in Damascus that the dead were residents of Bustan al-Qasr who were kidnapped and later killed.

Syrian state TV said the men were killed by members of Jabhat al-Nusra, an al Qaida-linked group. It said the men were killed after they demanded members of the group leave their areas.

Another activist group, the Local Co-ordination Committees, blamed government forces.