Assef Shawkat, Syria's shadowy enforcer

Assef Shawkat, brother-in-law of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, stands during the funeral of late president Hafez al-Assad in Damascus in this June 13, 2000 file photo. Shawkat was killed in a bomb attack which targeted a meeting of Assad's top security and military officials on July 18, 2012, Hezbollah's al-Manar television and a security source in Syria said.

BEIRUT: The world saw only a handful of pictures of Assef Shawkat. Few knew what he really did, or what power he wielded.

But any Syrian would have told you that President Bashar al-Assad's 62-year-old brother-in-law, reported to have been killed in a suicide attack in Damascus on Wednesday, was one of the pillars of Assad family rule.

Despite a difficult entry into the Assad clan, Shawkat was widely seen as a member of the president's inner circle. After years as deputy head and then chief of military intelligence, he had become deputy defence minister, another position that allowed him to wield power out of the limelight.

U.S. diplomatic cables published by Wikileaks described him as both a clever, well-read officer and as part of Syria's "killing problem".

Washington imposed sanctions on Shawkat in 2006 on suspicion that he orchestrated the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik al-Hariri and other officials seen as threats to Syrian influence.

"Shawkat has been a key architect of Syria's domination of Lebanon, as well as a fundamental contributor to Syria's long-standing policy to foment terrorism against Israel," the U.S. Treasury said at the time.

Activists fighting to topple Assad saw Shawkat as the iron fist of the establishment, pushing for a ruthless approach to the rebellion. But Lebanese security sources close to the Assads said Shawkat had always acted as part of a powerful, close-knit inner circle.

"Shawkat prefers force but he is just one part of the decision-making group. This regime is like a network," said a Lebanese security source close to the Damascus centre of power.

The "network" is mostly from Assad's minority Alawite sect, which dominates Syria's elite but is now confronted with an uprising led by the underdog Sunni Muslim majority.

INNER CIRCLE

When president Hafez al-Assad died in 2000 after almost 30 years in charge, Shawkat was believed to be one of a handful of people who helped to run the country before Bashar took power.

During Bashar's election campaign, critics made mock posters with caricatures of him, his brother Maher and Shawkat. The caption read: "For the first time in Syria: Vote for one president, get two more absolutely free."

The joke highlighted the shift in Syrian governance after Hafez's death, from a personality cult carefully led by one man to a group of co-captains.

Opposition figures say the lack of transparency in government and the secrecy that shrouds top figures is one reason for their difficulty in trying to negotiate with Syria's rulers.

They say Shawkat appeared in public only twice after the revolt grew into an armed insurgency. He went to Zabadani, a mountain resort near the capital, when the rebels temporarily seized it. Later he went to the city of Homs, centre of the uprising, when the army launched an assault on rebel-held areas.

Hundreds were killed in both places.

"Both times, the same thing happened. He met with some rebels, he told them: 'Move out of the area and we will turn the lights and water back on. The assault will stop'," said one activist, who asked not to be identified.

"Both times, the rebels withdrew from their positions. The lights and water went back on. And both times, the shelling started the next day.

"This is what puzzles us: Did he trick the rebels? Or had he simply lost the authority to tell the army what to do?"

BIG BREAK

Shawkat's marriage into the Assad family brought him mixed fortunes, and his life read in some ways like something out of the soap operas he was said to write as a hobby.

Shawkat was a member of the Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam that has dominated the elite since Hafez al-Assad took power in 1970. But other than religion, he had little in common with the Assad children, born into the ruling class.

He left his modest home in the coastal Tartous province and joined the army, working his way up through the ranks.

But his big break came when he divorced his first wife and married Bushra, Bashar's older sister.

The move took nerve and nous, given that both the late president and his eldest son and heir apparent Basil both disapproved of Shawkat, according to diplomats and members of the security services.

Basil considered Shawkat too lowly to join the Assad clan and even jailed him in 1993 to keep him away from Bushra, according to security sources and to U.S. diplomatic cables published by Wikileaks.

Then a year later Basil died in a car crash, and the couple married. Hafez al-Assad made Shawkat deputy chief of military intelligence, and in 2005 Bashar appointed him to head the unit. positions that enabled him to pull strings in Syria's dealings with its troubled neighbours, Iraq and Lebanon.

One leaked American cable called him "the comeback player of the regime".

But Shawkat's relationship with the new generation of Assads appears to have been tempestuous.

Diplomats say Maher, Bashar's younger brother and head of the elite Republican Guard, once shot him. Some believe Bashar himself was wary of his brother-in-law and his sister, who was the favourite of their late father.

"We do know there was a certain amount of rivalry ... Shawkat and Bushra for quite a long time used to think of themselves as more presidential than Bashar and (his wife) Asma," said British historian Patrick Seale.

Whatever the personal tensions, Shawkat never seems to have wavered in his determination to keep the ruling clan and the Alawite establishment in power.

"They know their fate is shared and that could mean paying the ultimate price," said the Lebanese source with close knowledge of the Damascus government.

"If one of them falls, they all do."

Panetta: Syria violence 'spinning out of control'

Comments come hours after Syria's defense minister and Assad's brother-in-law were killed in a

The situation in Syria is "spinning out of control," U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said on Wednesday, adding that President Bashar Assad's government would be held responsible if it failed to safeguard its chemical weapons sites.

Syria's defense minister and Assad's brother-in-law were killed in a Damascus suicide bomb attack carried out by a bodyguard on Wednesday, the most serious blow to the president's high command in the country's 16-month-old rebellion.

"This is a situation that is rapidly spinning out of control," Panetta said, adding that the international community needed to "bring maximum pressure on President Bashar Assad to do what's right, to step down and allow for that peaceful transition."

Panetta's comments to a Pentagon news conference followed closed door talks with his British counterpart, Defense Secretary Philip Hammond. Hammond, speaking alongside Panetta, said he believed the situation in Syria was deteriorating and "becoming more and more unpredictable."

The Damascus attack, Hammond said, showed the country's growing instability as the violence gets closer to the heart of the government.

"I think what we're seeing is an opposition which is emboldened, clearly an opposition which has access increasingly to weaponry, probably some fragmentation around the edges of the regime as well," he told reporters.

The Assad government appears to be quietly shifting some chemical weapons from storage sites, Western and Israeli officials have said, but it is not clear whether the operation is merely a security precaution amid Syria's escalating internal conflict.

The Syrian government denies carrying out the operation. Syrian's undeclared stockpile - believed to be the largest of its kind in the Middle East - reportedly includes sarin nerve agent, mustard gas and cyanide.

"We've made very clear to them that they have a responsibility to safeguard their chemical sites and that we will hold them responsible should anything happen with regards to those sites," Panetta said, adding that the United States was working closely with its allies on the issue.

Hammond said it was important to marshal the support of those countries that still give tacit support to the regime, in what appeared to be a veiled reference to Russia and China.

"So our diplomacy has to focus on getting those who have the greatest influence with the regime to ensure that it acts responsibly in relations to chemical weapons," Hammond said.

US-Russia push Syria solution, Assad vows to ‘annihilate terrorists’

The US secretary of state and her Russian counterpart will push to find common ground on the Syrian conflict at a summit in St Petersburg. The meeting comes as bomb blasts struck Damascus and Syrian President Assad pledged to “annihilate terrorists.”

­The two powers are expected to discuss Kofi Annan’s unity government plan ahead of a crucial meeting on Syria in Geneva on Saturday, which will bring together UN Security Council members, European and some Middle East countries.

Annan’s plan does not call for Assad’s ouster, but pushes for the creation of a transitional government that would exclude figures that jeopardize stability.

Washington is a strong advocate of a political transition plan in Syria that stipulates the removal of President Assad. However, Russia categorically opposes the idea that other countries should dictate the future of Syria, believing that the decision is up to Syrians themselves.

"We will not support and cannot support any meddling from outside or any imposition of recipes. This also concerns the fate of the president of the country, Bashar al-Assad," Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on the eve of the meeting.

A number of opposition groups, including the Free Syria Army have refused to comply with any plan that does not include the step-down of Assad.

The outcome of Clinton and Lavrov’s meeting in St Petersburg could set the precedent for the success of the negotiations in Geneva.

Meanwhile, in a rare interview with Iranian television on Thursday Syrian president Assad rejected any solution to the conflict that was imposed from outside the country.

"We will not accept any non-Syrian, non-national model, whether it comes from big countries or friendly countries. No one knows how to solve Syria's problems as well as we do," he said.

During the hour-long interview Assad pledged to “annihilate terrorists in any corner of the country,” describing it as the government’s duty.

"When you eliminate a terrorist, it's possible that you are saving the lives of tens, hundreds, or even thousands," he told Syrian state television.

The Syrian president’s words followed with twin bomb attacks that struck the Syrian capital on Thursday. The blasts went off close to Damascus’ Palace of Justice and injured three people, reported Syrian state television.

Turkish gov’t puts Syrian border troops on red alert

Turkey gives its troops on the Syrian border license to kill in case of any vioaliton as PM Erdoğan vows to treat any Syrian threat to the frontier as a military target

‘We urge the Syrian regime not to make a mistake and test Turkey’s determinacy and capacity,’ says PM Erdoğan.

The Turkish government has instructed its army to intercept any potential security risk posed by Syrian security forces along its land and sea border, in response to the downing of a Turkish jet by Syria in international airspace. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has also described the al-Assad regime as a “clear and present danger to Turkey’s security” in the wake of the incident.

“After this attack, we have entered into a new stage. The rules of engagement of the Turkish Armed Forces have changed. Any risk posed by Syria on the Turkish border, any military element that could pose a threat, will be considered a threat and treated as a military target,” Erdoğan said in his parliamentary group meeting yesterday. The comments are his first public statements on the issue after it was clarified that a Turkish RF4-E Phantom jet had been shot down by Syria.

‘Turkey’s wrath is as strong as its friendship’

“We urge the Syrian regime not to make a mistake and test Turkey’s determinacy and capacity. … Our rational response should not be perceived as weakness, our mild manners do not mean we are a tame lamb. … Everybody should know that Turkey’s wrath is as strong and devastating as its friendship is valuable.” A Turkish unarmed reconnaissance jet that was performing a training flight over the Mediterranean Sea was shot down by Syria 13 nautical miles off the Syrian coast in international airspace. Syria had claimed the incident took place in Syrian airspace.

Five Syrian helicopters recently violated Turkish airspace, but no action was taken against them other than issuing diplomatic notes. Some minor shooting incidents have even taken place without being made into an issue between the two countries, a Turkish diplomat told the Hürriyet Daily News. “After now, if they occur, they will surely become a matter,” the source said. Erdoğan underlined that Turkey would also use its rights stemming from international laws. “Turkey will use its rights born out of international law with determination and take the necessary steps by determining the time, place and method by itself in the face of this unfairness. This is what I want to stress.”

According to diplomatic sources, this refers to Article 51 of the 7th Chapter of the U.N. Charter, which gives countries the right to self-defense in the event of a foreign attack. The prime minister also challenged the Syrian administration’s argument that it shot down the jet in its own airspace. “Our plane was targeted on purpose and in a hostile way and not as a result of a mistake. The attitude of the Syrian officials following the incident is the most concrete evidence that our jet was attacked on purpose. The harassing fire on our Casa-type plane during the search and rescue operations is the most palpable evidence of this intent.”

‘Turkey’s support will continue’

Despite his strongly worded statements that also mentioned increasing military measures against Syria, Erdoğan said they would not fall into the traps of what he called “war provocateurs,” although “this does not mean we’ll stand idle with our hands tied.”

He also vowed that Turkey would continue to support the Syrian people until they get rid of the “blood-shedding dictator and his gang.”

Turkey has no eye on any neighbors’ soil and has no intention to intervene in their internal affairs, Erdoğan said, emphasizing that the security of Anatolia was very much dependent on the security of Damascus, once ruled by the Ottoman Empire until the early 20th century. “Today when we are talking about Damascus, Aleppo, Hama, and Homs, we are not talking about political gain, but in the name of the bloodshed of our brothers.”

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TURKEY BEGINS DEPLOYMENT

Turkey has deployed a large number of military vehicles to the Syrian border. The shipment included 15 armored tanks, in addition to long-distance guns and other military vehicles. The convoy was heavily guarded as it moved toward the border in the event of an attack by outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) members. Military sources couldn’t immediately confirm the report. Military units reportedly increased security measures on the border following recent events that have strained bilateral relations. In a related development in the region, 13 zones near Hakkari, Diyarbakır and Şırnak have been declared temporary militray security zones. Diyarbakır Governor’s Office said yesterday in a written satement that no civilians will be allowed in the mentioned regions between July 6 and Oct. 6 since shooting drills will be exercised in those areas.

Turkish jet clearly violated Syria's sovereignty – Damascus tells its Russian Supporter & Arms Supplier

The downing of a Turkish plane by Syria was an act of self-defense against a violation of its sovereignty, the Syrian foreign ministry has said. Damascus insists it was within its right to open fire on unidentified aircraft violating its airspace.

The statement by the Syrian foreign ministry spokesman Jihad Magdissi comes a day after Ankara accused Damascus of violating international law in last Friday’s incident.

Magdissi said the Turkish claim that their military jet was shot down in international air space after leaving Syrian territory was false. The aircraft was hit by air defense artillery, not a surface-to-air missile, and this weapon’s maximum range is just 1.2 kilometers, he said in a statement aired on Syrian TV.

Commenting on the claims that no warning has been given before the downing, Magdissi said the Syrian defense forces “have been taken by surprise to see such a plane.”

“And even the plane was Syrian and we could not identify it, we would have shot it down,” he said.

He added Syria did its best to mitigate the consequences of the incident by promptly contacting their Turkish counterparts and offering all due assistance in the search and rescue operations.

This was done despite the fact that relations between the two countries have deteriorated over the past 15 months, he stressed.