President Khoja said that Russia had sent 2,000 mercenaries to Syria and wants to raise the figure to 20,000, stressing that the game President Putin is playing in Syria will eventually backfire. He warns Russia against meeting the same fate the former Soviet Union met in Afghanistan.
In an interview with CNN Turk TV channel yesterday, President Khoja said that Russia aims to prop up Bashar al-Assad and grants him a stronger position in any possible peace negotiations. He also said that a political solution is impossible as long as Russia is invading Syria, stressing that the Syrian Coalition will not sit with the Russians at the negotiating table.
Khoja pointed out that the Russian aerial attacks targeted Syrian rebels, adding that most of the victims who died as a result of these attacks were civilians. He stated that Russia must realize that it cannot win a war through barbaric aerial bombardment, stressing that Assad and Russia will eventually lose the battle against rebel fighters.
Khoja also pointed the Free Syrian Army counts over 70,000 fighters and was formed by defecting officers from the Assad regime, stressing that what is happening in Syria is not a civil war but it is aggression launched by the Assad regime on the Syrian people.
Khoja stressed that Bashar al-Assad is the only one responsible for the continued aggression, adding that the solution to the crisis is contingent on removing him from power. He said that the Syrian Coalition has always sought a political solution, but today Syria is coming under a Russian-Iranian invasion that requires supporting Syrian rebels to counter it. (Source: Syrian Coalition)
