REPORT

Security Council

The crisis in the Syrian Arab Republic 

and the ways of resolving it

Contents

Introduction……………………………………………………………..p.3

The statement of the problem…………………………………………..p.7

The international legal basis for resolving conflict in the Syrian Arab Republic……………………………………………………………………..p.12

Conclusion……………………………………………………………..p.18

Sources…………………………………………………………………p.21

Introduction

During more than two years the attention of the world community is drawn to the situation in the Middle East. The series of antigovernment demonstrations known as the Arab Spring or the Arab Revolutions began on 17 December 2010 with a series of street demonstrations that took place in Tunisia. After that incident, the intensive campaign of civil resistance occurred in Egypt, Libya, Yemen and Bahrain. Major protests have broken out in Algeria, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco and Sudan; and minor protests have occurred in Lebanon, Mauritania, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Djibouti and Western Sahara. Anti-government protests in Libya descended the country into bloody and terrible civil war which caused the death of thousands people. Nowadays the situation in the Middle East is alarm due to condition of the Syrian Arab Republic which is in state of terror and many its citizens are in danger.

The wave of Arab Revolutions reached Syria on March 15, 2011, when residents of a small southern city took to the streets to protest the torture of students who had put up anti-government graffiti. The government responded with heavy-handed force, and demonstrations quickly spread across much of the country.

By the late summer of 2012, the country was in a full-blown civil war. More than 21,000 people, mostly civilians, were thought to have died and tens of thousands of others had been arrested. By September 21, 2012, over 260,000 Syrian refugees had registered in neighboring countries — about half of whom left during August, while tens of thousands more have not registered. In addition, about 2.5 million Syrians needed aid inside the country, with more than 1.2 million displaced domestically[1].

Active hostilities rage between Government forces and anti-Government armed groups. Sporadic clashes between the armed actors evolved into continuous combat, involving more brutal tactics and new military capabilities on both sides. The level of armed violence varied throughout the country. The countries all around the world condemn President Assad and his government for their incapacity to stop the violence and preventing the murder of civil citizens.

Proceeding collisions between Government forces and rebels are explained not only by the political and social reasons, but also by the interconfessional conflicts. The interconfessional conflicts are especially dangerous due to the fact that they are able to spill over borders and take the entire region into the religious war. Tensions have also spilled over borders into Lebanon, Iraq, Turkey and Jordan, and fears have increased with evidence that Al Qaeda was behind a rise in suicide bombings in 2012.

The complication of the situation in Syria consists of many political and military problems. However, the issue of today is stopping violence and murdering of innocent people. It is possible to solve all the other problems only after solving this one.

The statement of the problem

Today’s conflict in Syria has a double nature: on the one hand, there are contradictions between Alawites and Sunnis since the beginning of 1980^th, and on the other hand, it is a part of the Arab Spring when the Syrians were inspirited by the successful revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt.

Historical background to conflicts between Alawites and Sunnis

The country’s last serious stirrings of public discontent had come in 1982, when increasingly violent skirmishes with the Muslim Brotherhood prompted Hafez al-Assad to move against them, sending troops to kill at least 10,000 people and smashing the old city of Hama. Hundreds of fundamentalist leaders were jailed, many never seen alive again.

Syria has a liability not found in the successful uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt — it is a majority Sunni nation that is ruled by a religious minority, the Alawite sect of Shiite Islam. Hafez Assad forged his power base through fear, cooption and sect loyalty. He built an alliance with an elite Sunni business community, and created multiple security services staffed primarily by Alawites.[2]

Alawites make up more than 10 percent of the Syrian population. The roots of the animosity toward the Alawites from members of Syria’s Sunni Muslim majority, who make up about 75 percent of the population, run deep into history. During the 19th-century Ottoman Empire, the two groups lived in separate communities, and the Sunni majority so thoroughly marginalized Alawites that they were not even allowed to testify in court until after World War I.

Then French colonialists collaborated with the Alawite minority to control the conquered Syrian population — as colonialists did with Christians in Lebanon, Jews in Palestine and Sunni Muslims in Iraq. The French brought Alawites into the colony’s military to help control the Sunnis. And after Syria’s independence from France, the military eventually took control of the country, putting Alawites in top government positions, much to the resentment of the Sunni majority.[3]

Nowadays Alawites fear that if Sunnis come to power, they will kill them all. That’s why they see President Bashar al-Assad as their best protection against sectarian annihilation especially after the murder of Sunnis who were killed by government forces and militias.