Rifaat
al-Assad, the exiled brother of Syria's late president, is not
seeking to take control, his son said yesterday. "I know my
father and he is not somebody who wants power," Soumar
al-Assad told the Guardian.
"If he is sure that security
has returned to Syria and that power is in the hands of the people
he will rest quietly at home."
This sign of conciliation runs
counter to the earlier insistence of a spokesman at Rifaat's home
in Marbella that Rifaat "represents legitimacy in Syria"
and is "awaiting the appropriate moment" to return. The
apparent absence of wide support in Syria may have persuaded the
Rifaat camp to cool its pronouncements for now.
Soumar, who runs Arabic News
Network, a London-based satellite TV station transmitting to the
Middle East, described yesterday's Damascus funeral for President
Hafez al-Assad as "completely inhuman".
"They [the regime] are trying
to profit from the crying of the people to create some kind of
political gain. Now they are trying to make the people of Syria
pay the price of creating an inexperienced leader [the dead
president's son, Bashar] purely because he's the son of his
father," he said. "They are doing this by jumping over
the will of the people. This is very dangerous for the stability
of Syria and the stability of the Middle East.
"The people of Syria are
mostly in favour of Rifaat, not because he has beautiful eyes but
because he has fought all his life for what they want."
Syria's authorities are reported
to have ordered that Rifaat be arrested if he tries to return.
Soumar refused to say where his father is - usually he is to be
found in Spain or France - other than saying "he's in
Europe".
Soumar said his father believed
that democratic elections for the Syrian presidency should be
held. "But before that, you need to restore democratic
institutions, freedom of speech and stability based on
institutions and not on a man."
Asked how his father's 1983 coup
attempt squared with talk of democracy, Soumar said: "The
coup attempt was against my father. Rifaat had a different idea
from the Ba'ath party - he was against power being held in the
hands of a few people."
On Rifaat's attitude to peace
talks with Israel, his son said: "It's a complicated issue
and my father's priority is to internal affairs." |