DUBAI: The US remains committed to its partnership with local forces in Syria to prevent Daesh’s resurgence and does not plan to withdraw from the country’s northeast region anytime soon, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs has said.
Speaking to Asharq Al-Awsat, Ethan Goldrich said: “I know there have been reports, but I want to make clear that we remain committed to the role that we play in that part of Syria, to the partnership that we have with the local forces that we work with, and to the need to prevent that threat from reemerging.”
“So right now, our focus is on the mission that we have there to keep ISIS from reemerging. So I know there have been reports, but I want to make clear that we remain committed to the role that we play in that part of Syria, to the partnership that we have with the local forces that we work with, and to the need to prevent that threat from reemerging,” Goldrich said.
The official said that while there have been a lot of accomplishments since taking on the post three years ago, there was still a “lot that we have left to do.”
“At the beginning of a time I was here, we had just completed a review of our Syria policy, and we saw that we needed to focus on reducing suffering for the people in Syria. We needed to reduce violence. We needed to hold the regime accountable for things that are done and most importantly, from the US perspective, we needed to keep ISIS from reemerging as a threat to our country and to other countries,” he said.
“At the same time, we also realized that there wouldn’t be a solution to the crisis until there was a political process under Resolution 2254, so in each of these areas, we’ve seen both progress and challenges, but of course, on ISIS, we have prevented the reemergence of the threat from northeast Syria, and we’ve helped deal with people that needed to be repatriated out of the prisons, and we dealt with displaced people in Al-Hol to reduce the numbers there. We helped provide for stabilization in those parts of Syria.”
Goldrich also said that the US remains committed in its humanitarian role for Syria, noting the $593 million Washington has pledged during a fundraising conference in Brussels recently.
“Since the beginning of the conflict, have provided $18 billion both to help the Syrians who are inside of Syria and to help the refugees who are in surrounding countries. And so we remain committed to providing that assistance, and we remain keenly aware that 90% of Syrians are living in poverty right now, and that there’s been suffering there.”
“We’re doing everything we can to reduce the suffering, but I think where we would really like to be is where there’s a larger solution to the whole crisis, so Syrian people someday will be able to provide again for themselves and not need this assistance,” he added.
Goldrich also reiterated the US’s position regarding President Bashar Assad – with some countries signaling a possible reopening of ties with the Syrian regime – that “we will not normalize with the regime in Syria until there’s been authentic and enduring progress on the goals of Resolution 2254, until the human rights of the Syrian people are respected and until they have the civil and human rights that they deserve.”
“We know other countries have engaged with the regime. When those engagements happen, we don’t support them, but we remind the countries that are engaged that they should be using their engagements to push forward on the shared international goals under 2254, and that whatever it is that they’re doing should be for the sake of improving the situation of the Syrian people.”
“The US will remain true to our own principles and our own policies and our own laws, and the path for the regime in Syria to change its relationship with us is very clear, if they change the behaviors that led to the laws that we have and to the policies that we have, if those behaviors change and the circumstances inside of Syria change, then it’s possible to have a different kind of relationship, but that’s where it has to start,” he added.
If there is one thing that Goldrich wants to happen in Syria, he said that it was “to hold people accountable in Syria for things that have happened... and we’re trying to draw attention to the need to account for the missing people.”
“I’d like to see some peace for the families of the missing people. I’d like to see the beginning of a political process, there hasn’t been a meeting of the constitutional committee in two years, and I think that’s because the regime has not been cooperating in political process steps. So we need to change that situation.”
“The Syrian people deserve all aspects of our policy to be fulfilled and for them to be able to return to a normal life,” Goldrich said.
