Vice-president of the Syrian Coalition Okab Yahya, said that Russia is trying to achieve military victory by throwing its troops into the battlefield in Syria after the Assad regime failed to achieve the objectives of the ongoing military campaign in the ‘de-escalation zone’ in northern Syria.
Yahya said that Moscow is hastily seeking to finish the fierce battles in northwestern Syria before returning to the political process which the UN envoy Geir Pederson announced will be resumed in the next few days.
Russia is once again seeking to impose a new reality on the ground and subjecting the international community to its demands by acquiring new pressure cards. These cards are today represented in attempts to capture new areas in northern Syria and placing them under the control of the Assad regime.
Yahya said that Moscow has only one option: murder, destruction, more crimes against civilians, and the targeting of residential areas and civilian facilities as well as civil defense centers and medical facilities. These acts ended any semblance of life with the aim of forcing the civilian population to flee, Yahya added.
Moscow’s denial of the deployment of ground troops in the ongoing battles in northwestern Syria indicated that it was not certain of victory and afraid that its forces may be defeated by the Free Syrian Army.
Since the beginning of their military campaign in northwestern Syria, the Assad regime and Russian forces have so far failed to achieve significant progress in the face of the FSA fighters, which is contrary to Russian expectations.
Reuters quoted Naji Mustafa, spokesman for the National Liberation Front (NLF) as saying that Russia has not only failed but has been defeated. Jamil al-Salih, commander of the FSA al-Izza Army, said that the Assad regime found itself in trouble so it asked for the deployment of Russian ground forces. (Source: Syrian Coalition’s Media Department)