Understanding Syria’s war | Crisis Management Lab
During our Crisis Management Lab, at Panteion University, we were asked to research about the war in Syria and discover the causes and facts that led to it, in order to understand better what is happening near us. We, Innovartists, tried to approach the matter from its starting point up until now, aiming to understand what led to this man-made catastrophe.
Before the conflict
To understand this topic better, we need to examine the state in which Syrian people were in, even before any uprising. There are three characteristic factors that should be noted about living in Syria then:
1. People were living in high unemployment
2. Officials were behaving brutally, with no rules
3. There was a lack of political freedom under their President Bashar al-Assad.
With all these in mind, the conflict starts in 2011, in the Syrian city of Deraa. It was a time of uprisings and change in the Arabic world. An era that is known as the Arab Spring, a name that symbolizes these changes. As the uprisings were successful, Tunisia’s and Egypt’s presidents lost their power. An important factor, filling Syrian pro-democracy activists with hope.
· Protests continued with the people asking for freedom and democracy.
· The Syrian government, led by President Bashar al-Assad, responded violently. Hundreds of people were killed or imprisoned for taking part in uprisings.
· These caused Syrian people to react. They demanded that the President resigns. However, people were divided. Some Syrians supported Bashar al-Assad while others fought to overthrow the government. This is when fights between the two started.
In July 2011 the military formed the Free Syrian Army, a rebel group aiming to overthrow the government. The protests continued and people were more and more conflicted between the groups. One year later, in July 2012, the International Red Cross officially claimed that the violence in Syria had become so widespread that it was in a state of civil war.
The Situation Today
Today’s situation in Syria isn’t the best. As of February 2018, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) had registered over 5.5 million refugees from Syria and estimated that there are over 6.5 million internally displaced persons (IDP) within Syria’s borders. Only a couple of weeks ago, the Trump administration ordered US troops to step aside from the border in northern Syria, effectively paving the way for Turkey to launch an offensive against US-backed Kurdish forces who they regard as enemies. That resulted in Kurdish forces near the northern Syrian border striking a deal with the Syrian government, marking a major shift in the country’s eight-year war.
Rebel Groups
Since the conflict began, as a Syrian rebellion against the Assad government, many new rebel groups have joined the fighting in Syria and have frequently fought one another.
The Free Syrian Army (FSA) is a loose conglomeration of armed brigades formed in 2011 by defectors from the Syrian army and civilians backed by the United States, Turkey, and several Gulf countries.
In December 2016, the Syrian army scored its biggest victory against the rebels when it recaptured the strategic city of Aleppo. Since then, the FSA has controlled limited areas in northwestern Syria.
In 2018, Syrian opposition fighters evacuated from the last rebel stronghold near Damascus. However, backed by Turkey, the FSA took control of Afrin, near the Turkey-Syria border, from Kurdish rebel fighters seeking self-rule.
ISIL emerged in northern and eastern Syria in 2013 after overrunning large portions of Iraq. The group quickly gained international notoriety for its brutal executions and its energetic use of social media to recruit fighters from around the world.
Other groups fighting in Syria include Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, Iran-backed Hezbollah, and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) dominated by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG).
The Syrian peace process
The Syrian peace process is the ensemble of initiatives and plans to resolve the Syrian Civil War, which has been ongoing in Syria since 2011 and has spilled beyond its borders. The peace process has been moderated by the Arab League, the UN Special Envoy on Syria, Russia and Western powers.
The negotiating parties to end the conflict are typically representatives of the Syrian Ba’athist government and Syrian opposition, while the Western-backed Kurdish forces have stayed out of the negotiations framework. Radical Salafist forces and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant have not engaged in any contacts on peaceful resolution to the conflict.
The attempts to find a solution to the Syrian conflict and bring stability to the Middle East began in late 2011, when the Arab League launched two initiatives, but without much success. Russia in January 2012 and in November 2013 suggested talks in Moscow between the Syrian government and opposition. In March–May 2012, hopes were on a United Nations/Arab League plan coordinated by former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan. In January and February 2014, the Geneva II Conference on Syria took place, organised by then-UN envoy to Syria Lakhdar Brahimi.
Peace talks with rebel leadership continued in Astana, Kazakhstan in 2017. The Kazakh officials are offering Astana as a neutral venue and “a natural home” for peace negotiations on Syria.
The latest major effort to bring about an end to the war started in October 2019 in Geneva with the convening of the Syrian Constitutional Committee to draft a new constitution for Syria under the auspices of the United Nations.
Our team ; Konstantina Amelia K. Eva Vasiou Marianna Menegatou Dikibo Kwnstantina
Academic Professors ; Mania Xenou Betty Tsakarestou
