Source : Al Akhbar English
Russia will not scrap plans to deliver an air defense system to Syria despite Western opposition because it would help deter "hotheads" intent on intervention in the two-year-old conflict, the deputy foreign minister said on Tuesday.
Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov also accused the European Union of "throwing fuel on the fire" by letting its own arms embargo on Syria expire.
"This directly harms the prospects of convening an international conference," said Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, referring to the EU decision Monday to lift an embargo against arming Syrian rebels but not the Damascus government.
But in some of the most explicit comments about Moscow's supplies of S-300 missiles to date, Ryabkov said the controversial contract to send the anti-aircraft missiles to Syria acted as a "stabilizing factor" in the Middle East.
"We consider these supplies a stabilizing factor," he said, adding that it could act as a deterrence against foreign intervention.
Russian officials have not disclosed whether S-300s have actually been sent to Syria and Ryabkov would not specify.
"I can't confirm or deny that these deliveries have taken place, I can only say that we will not disavow them," Ryabkov said. "We see that this issue worries many of our partners but we have no basis to review our position in this sphere."
Ryabkov's comments sparked a quick reaction from Israel, which said it "will know what to do" if the missile deliveries were made – an apparent allusion to another air-strike on Syria.
Ryabkov added that the missile supplies were related to a contract signed several years ago with the Syrian regime.
The minister also stressed that the weapons were purely defensive, insisting that they were designed to protect the government against outside forces, rather than serving to crush the domestic opposition.
Ryabkov reiterated that Russia's arms deliveries to Syria were legitimate because they were conducted under pre-war agreements that were reached with an internationally recognized government.
Ryabkov also argued that the fractured opposition's failure up to this stage to appoint a single representative at the proposed conference was the biggest existing stumbling block to peace.
"The fragmented nature of the groups fighting the government and the inability of our partners including the United States and the EU to ensure a sufficient level of representation by the opposition at the conference are the main stumbling block today."
The European Union agreed late Monday to lift its embargo on arming the opposition after much debate and a strong push for the measure by France and Britain.
A French official in Paris stressed that this was a "theoretical" lifting of the embargo that would not go into effect until August 1 at the earliest because the EU did not want to hurt the peace talks pushed by Moscow and Washington.
