Bahra: Defeating Assad Requires Upholding the Unity of the Syrian People

Hadi al-Bahra, president of the Syrian Coalition, stresses that “defeating the Assad regime and achieving the goals of our revolutionary project, aimed at building a modern state, requires preserving the unity of the Syrian people,” during the opening of the second  “Inside Syria Forum” which is being held in Gaziantep, Turkey. “Syria is and always will be for all Syrians, regardless of their sect, ethnicity or religion. As a result of Assad’s barbarity, our homeland has become a battlefield where outsiders are fighting to settle scores and to serve the interests of their own countries. We have become strangers whose fate is in the hands of far-fetched sectarian militias who are wreaking havoc and destruction in our homeland. We cannot but thank the government of Turkey and its people for opening its doors for the Syrian people and embracing them with utmost generosity and hospitality. To achieve victory we need to put aside our personal, partisan and ideological affiliations, and also must not content ourselves with criticizing the mistakes, but we have to work together to correct them. The Syrian Coalition will always remain open to everyone wishing to share us the responsibility and work hard to serve the homeland and the revolution. We are diligently working to develop the performance of the Syrian Coalition and reform its organizational structure and also to move to Syria to be with our people in their suffering and offer them whatever we can.” Furthermore, Bahra called on the conferees to “put forward initiatives and suggestions, as you are the flame this revolution and the makers of the future of this country.” The participants then discussed the “Foothold” project which was developed by the Syrian Coalition, while Al Bahra reviewed the project and received questions and exchanged views on the project. The “Inside Syria Forum concludes on Thursday and is being attended by more than 150 activists, Secretary General of the Syrian Coalition Nasr al-Hariri and interim prime minister Ahmed Tomeh. It includes training courses and joint projects in the political, media, relief, and medical fields. The conference aims to promote cooperation between activists and the Syrian Coalition, to illustrate the functions of the Syrian Coalitions’ apparatuses, to activate the role activists in the decision-making and to build genuine partnerships through the establishment of joint projects to resolve the outstanding problems. It also aims to strengthen the democratic aspect between the Syrian Coalition and activists and to activate the role of the civil society organizations. The Syrian Coalition organized the first conference of the “Inside Syria Forum” on 28 -29 April, 2014 with the participation of nearly 80 Syrian activists and a number of members of the political committee, the General Assembly, interim Prime Minister Ahmed Tomeh and his deputy Iyad Maqdisi. (Source: Syrian Coalition)