Annan wants Tehran to be part of Syria solution

UN envoy Annan says that Iran should be involved in efforts to end the violence in Syria. He also urges international community to raise pressure on both sides

Iran should be a part of the solution to the Syria crisis, international mediator Kofi Annan said June 22, a week before a planned crisis meeting, which is now in doubt due to Western objections to the Islamic Republic’s participation, is scheduled to take place.

The United States has vehemently opposed Russia’s demand for Iran’s involvement. Annan said the composition of the meeting is one of the sticking points that may not be resolved until next week. “I have made it quite clear that I believe Iran should be part of the solution,” Annan told reporters in Geneva. Iran, a powerful ally and neighbor of Syria, is the subject of a diplomatic standoff between the United States and Russia, which differ not only on the way forward on Syria but also on Iran’s nuclear program.

Annan also urged the international community to raise the level of pressure on both sides in the conflict.

“It’s time for countries of influence to raise the level of pressure on the parties on the ground and to persuade them to stop the killing and start the talking,” he said. Annan, who underlined the importance of making sure the crisis did not spread to neighbouring countries, also praised the work of the U.N.’s unarmed observers under Major General Robert Mood, head of the UN Supervision Mission in Syria (UNSMIS).

Mood, who was by Annan’s side in Geneva, said his observers could be “proud” of “a job well done.” On June 19, Mood told the U.N. Security Council that it was too dangerous for 300 U.N. monitors to operate at full capacity and suspended much of the mission’s tasks. “I am going to commend them on the job they are doing and are doing ... our aim is to continue with our mandated tasks,” he said.

Syria must do a lot more: Lavrov

In Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that he had urged Syria’s government to “do a lot more” to implement envoy Kofi Annan’s U.N.-backed peace plan, but that foreign countries must also press rebels to stop the violence.

After talks with Syria’s foreign minister, Lavrov said Syria’s government was prepared to withdraw forces from cities and towns simultaneously with rebels and suggested Moscow would seek support for such an agreement among other nations. His remarks appeared aimed at indicating that Moscow is putting pressure on President Bashar al-Assad’s government while at the same time making clear his opponents share the blame for the persistence of violence.

“We called on them to back their statement of readiness to carry out Kofi Annan’s plan with action,” Lavrov said of his meeting with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem on the sidelines of an economic forum in St. Petersburg. “They have already done a lot but they could and must do a lot more,” Lavrov told state-run Rossiya-24 television.

On the ground, the Syrian government accused rebels of carrying out a “brutal massacre” of 25 of its supporters. In the reported massacre, “armed terrorist groups … kidnapped a number of citizens in the Daret Azzeh area in the countryside of Aleppo, according to official sources in the province,” the state SANA news agency said.

Turkey host 12 generals

The independent Syrian Observatory for Human Rights gave a higher toll for the pro-regime losses, saying at least 26 government supporters, most of them members of the feared shabiha militia, had been killed.

It came after at least 168 were killed in violence across Syria on June 21, the highest single-day death toll since Annan Plan was supposed to take effect on April 12, the Observatory said. Meanwhile, Turkish Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Selçuk Ünal said Turkey hosts 32,750 Syrian refugees, including 12 generals from the Syrian army, denying reports that Riad al-Asaad commander of the Free Syrian Army had left Turkey.

Ünal also rebuffed allegations that weapons are shipped into Syria to Syrian opposition through Turkish borders after a report claimed the country was among nations arming rebels fighting the regime in Syria.

“No weapons are delivered from Turkey to any neighboring country, including Syria,” Ünal told reporters yesterday, adding that such articles were based on unidentified sources. The New York Times reported on June 21 that U.S. intelligence had settled in southern Turkey maintaining flow of weapons to Syrian opposition to ensure they do not fall into the hands of Al-Qaeda militants.

Citing unnamed U.S. officials and Arab intelligence officials the New York Times claimed the arms were being paid for by Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar and taken across the Turkish border.

The U.N also said the number of Syrians in need of humanitarian aid has shot up by 500,000 to 1.5 million in less than three months.

MEB troops to get prestigious valor award

About 28,000 U.S. and coalition forces who fought a thriving insurgency in Afghanistan in 2009 and 2010 under the command of a Marine expeditionary brigade will receive the prestigious Presidential Unit Citation, Marine Corps Times has learned.

Navy Secretary Ray Mabus has approved the PUC for personnel who served under Marine Expeditionary Brigade-Afghanistan from May 29, 2009, to April 12, 2010, for “outstanding performance in action against enemy forces,” said Maj. Shawn Haney, a spokeswoman for the Marine Corps Awards Branch, out of Quantico, Va. The award is considered the unit-level equivalent of the Navy Cross, second only to the Medal of Honor in recognizing heroism in combat.

MEB-Afghanistan is credited with launching a broad offensive against Taliban insurgents in Helmand, Farah and Nimroz provinces. The unit “conducted the most holistic counterinsurgency campaign since the Coalition presence in Afghanistan began in 2001,” according to the PUC citation signed by Mabus and obtained by Marine Corps Times.

The unit was commanded by Brig. Gen. Larry Nicholson and overseen by 2nd MEB, out of Camp Lejeune, N.C. Nicholson is now a two-star general, and serves as the senior military assistant to Ashton Carter, the deputy secretary of defense.

It marks the first time that a Marine-led unit has been awarded the PUC since early in the Iraq war, when the actions of I Marine Expeditionary Force (Reinforced), out of Camp Pendleton, Calif., during and shortly after the initial invasion were recognized.

Marine officials said a complete list of MEB units authorized to wear the blue, yellow and red-striped PUC ribbon will be announced in a forthcoming Marine administrative message.

The major subordinate elements included Regimental Combat Team 3, RCT-7, Marine Aircraft Group 40, Combat Logistics Regiment 2, and the brigade’s headquarters group. Marines comprised the bulk of the MEB’s forces, but there also are U.S. soldiers, airmen and sailors, coalition forces, and Navy Department civilians who will be recognized, Haney said.

The MEB arrived in Afghanistan in spring 2009 as the U.S. grew its military footprint in the southern part of the country to take on deeply entrenched Taliban fighters in a countryside checkered with rolling poppy fields. The citation highlights two offensives in particular: Khanjar and Moshtarak, bloody offensives in Helmand province that expelled insurgents from areas where they had been deeply entrenched.

In Operation Khanjar, some 4,000 Marines and 650 Afghan soldiers assaulted sections of Garmser, Khanashin and Nawa districts in July 2009. The name of the operation translates roughly to “Strike the Sword.” Units involved in the offensive include 2nd Battalion, 8th Marines, and 2nd Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion, both out of Lejeune; and 1st Battalion, 5th Marines, out of Pendleton.

In Operation Moshtarak, more than 15,000 U.S., British, French, Canadian and Afghan troops assaulted the Marjah section of Helmand in February 2010. They faced stiff initial resistance, and suffered multiple casualties due to a network of improvised explosive devices and snipers employed by the Taliban.