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Dr . Muhydin Lazikani
In an exclusive interview with Asia News Agency, Dr Lazikani said last week that the Kazakhstan meeting between the regime and the opposition will not take place unless the ceasefire is imposed and monitored properly and forcefully by Russia and Turkey. He added that not all the Syrian opposition groups will take their place around the negotiation table, because Russia will insist on criminalizing some of them and accusing them of terrorism. However, he assumed that maybe the Turkish foreign minister will be able to form a reliable delegation when he meets with Dr Riyad Hijab in Doha, Qatar.
Dr Lazikani said that even if the Astana negotiations managed to take place at the end of next month, they will not be fruitful without complete support from the United States when the new administration takes over from the current one. The Russians know this, so they are acting to fill the vacuum that was created by the American withdrawal from their commitment with the Russians regarding a political solution in Syria.
He predicted that at certain times the Russians will agree to go back to Geneva, because Vladimir Putin wants to involve Europe and the United States in the future negotiations to see if he can put the Ukrainian problem and Crimea on the table.
He added that what is still a secret up to now is what stand Donald Trump, the elected president, is going to take with regard to the Syrian crisis. This is still a mystery because Trump said many things, and some have contradicted one another. Lately, Trump said that he has unique ideas to solve the problem in Syria which nobody has had before him, but he did not explain what these ideas are.
Regarding the Turkish stand, Dr Lazikani believes that Turkey is now paying the price for its hesitation in the past towards its neighbouring country. He predicted that Turkey will continue to work with Russia as long as they agree on weakening their main enemy, the Kurds.
Lazikani, who has lived in exile since the time of Al-Assad the father, also predicted that the Russians will try to show their positivity on the international arena, to demonstrate that their plan for the future Syria is more workable than the American one. But this positivity will always clash with their allies, the Iranians, who have a different agenda regarding Syria’s future.
Dr Lazikani concluded that the regime of Bashar Al-Assad is the weakest one in the land, because Al-Assad has become one of the warlords like Al-Jolani, Al-Baghdadi, and the rest of the heads of the fighting groups—not to mention the fact that he commands less than 22% of Syrian land. When the ceasefire is in place, said Lazikani, the peaceful demonstrations will take over the whole Syrian territory, calling for the downfall of the regime. Then, the regime will not be able to do anything; its weakest point is that its decision is not in its own hands, but in the hands of the people supporting it, mainly Russia, Iran, and the sectarian militias from Lebanon and Iraq.
