US must stop supporting terrorists in Syria: Analyst

Press TV has interviewed Lawrence Freeman, from the Africa desk of the Executive Intelligence Review in Baltimore, to discuss the latest round of international negotiations aimed at working out a solution to the conflict in Syria.

The following is a rough transcription of the interview.

Press TV: Well surprising development, there is not talk about military option anymore, it seems like the world leaders have agreed finally that there has to be a political solution to the crisis in Syria but what do you think has led them to this conclusion?

Freeman: Well I think you see the effect of the refugees crisis which is a direct result of the regime change policy that President Obama pursued in Libya and we have been pursuing also in Syria and this has caused Europe to reflect and think about their countries, the whole European Union is going to be under attack and swallowed up as long as this crisis continues.

The other thing has been the intervention of President Putin. I mean starting with his presentation at United Nations General Assembly in late September and immediately following that the military campaign that President Putin has launched into Syria to go after the terrorists is opposite and diametrically opposed to the support of terrorism that has come from Obama and this has also changed the entire geometry in Syria as well.  

Press TV: And how do you think these talks can actually yield results given that the Syrian opposition has already ruled out the election roadmap when we are seeing that both parties - the Syria government and the opposition - are not on the same page when it comes to a political solution?  

Freeman: Well one of the reasons for this is we do not even know exactly who the Syrian opposition is. Don’t forget President Obama declared early on several years ago that Assad, the President of Syria had to go. There was no justification for that, there was no reason for that, except regime change policy. And then we began supporting various groups including terrorist groups and President Obama was advised by General Flynn in 2012 who was head of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) that if we kept supporting these terrorist groups, they are going to feed into the ISIS (Daesh) geometry and those forces out to destroy the country and nevertheless the United States went ahead and supported these groups.

This has now changed somewhat with the introduction of the Russian developments. So the question of the who the rebels are and what will they accept, this will be imposed on them by this international force and Senator Kerry has actually taken a position different from President Obama and I would say without President Obama’s policies from 2011 on, we would not have the crisis that we have today. ISIS can be defeated.  There has to include a component of massive economic development which is also being discussed and we have to stop supporting the terrorists which the United States unfortunately has done now for a number of years and a solution can be found.

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