|
 |
 |
|
Spreading sectarian conflict 'most probable' scenario in Syria says US ambassador to UN
Spreading sectarian violence across the Middle East is now the “most probable" scenario as a result of the conflict in Syria, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice told reporters Wednesday following a UN Security Council briefing on the situation.
Susan Rice said the success of UN special representative Kofi Annan's peace plan or, barring that, Security Council agreement on further sanctions could help defuse the situation. But both those scenarios seem unlikely in the wake of last Friday's massacre of more than 100 civilians that the United States and others have pinned on the Syrian government and its proxy forces.
“In the absence of either of those two scenarios,” Rice said, “there seems to me to be only one other alternative – and that is indeed the worst case, which seems unfortunately at the present to be the most probable – and that is that the violence escalates, the conflict spreads and intensifies and reaches a higher degree of intensity and involves countries in the region, it takes on increasing sectarian forms, and we have a major crisis not only in Syria but in the region.”
Rice's comments were aimed at the Syrian government and members of the Security Council, particularly Russia, which she said must remain united in raising pressure on Syria.
“If we don't,” Rice said, “then we are all resigning ourselves to [the] third scenario.”
