On the Syrian Government aimed at protecting civilians from further war crimes and preventing any Foreign Investment with president assads regime. Syrian writers and scholars look at the economic and political impact of the sanctions. The sanctions announced last week came into force and came into force and its an unprecedented economic crisis in syria bring the syrian pound to roughly 3000 to a single u. S. Dollar. Small businesses are closing and ports are plummeting of those living under the poverty line already at 85 are increasing in number. An average monthly salary in syria reportedly by a large bag of limits. Corruption has triggered a crisis and humanitarian the potential famine this winter. While lebanon remains my the economic crisis and kelly continues to spread in syria, the decision 600 the rollout of the turkish lira to nearly a third of their income population. The northwest to be the nail in the coffin to what remains. In the podcast released last week are nonresident scholar daniel focus on the internal dynamics of regime held syria positive at the current crises inside syria might represent more dangerous threats than any military threat seen in recent years. And yet as its citizens facing crazily dire conditions the regime has spent hundreds of millions of dollars in recent weeks on new fighter jets from russia, Armored Vehicles and it is burned wide swaths of Agricultural Land in the northwest of the country. Fueled by these economic and the political frustrations, syria minority Druze Committee has taken to the streets holding bold antiregime protests and expressing unusual solidarity with the opposition in italy. Protests have been seen in syria Southern Province were an expanding insurgency is developing. The regime controlled central desert isis is slowly researching and and loyalist canaries public expression of discontent and criticism for the regime are emerging more clearly than any point since 2011. So might the sanction seemed up with diplomacy force the same machine or two russian and ringing to compromise or will they only serve to exacerbate human suffering across the country . These and many more questions will be up for discussion today. To take part of this discussion im really thrilled to introduce our panelist. First we had ambassador James Jeffrey whos going to use special representative for syria engagement and the use special envoy to the Global Coalition to defeat isis. Ambassador jeffrey also from has held senior positions crossley, including Deputy National security adviser and is a master and iraq and turkey. Next we have rime allaf, and political analyst who will a seat the board of the day after project and was an associate fellow from 20042012. And we finally have qutaiba idlbi, nonresident fellow of the me i Syria Program as as a forr detainee and torture victim himself, easy and unique position to talk on this panel and is also serious fellow at the National Center for Transitional Justice were his work focuses on political imprisonment in syria. Ambassador jeffrey, welcome. Finally if you are smart. In terms of the format each pencil begin with roughly five minutes of opening remarks followed by a moderated discussion. This event is live on zoom, on our live stream and live on cspan. For the many people worldwide only dive dialed into this even zoom i would encourage all to submit question using the q a feature which you should see on your screen. For those dialing in by phone, watching on our live stream or on cspan you can submit questions to us by emailing them to events at any i. Edu. Feel free to submit questions at any point during the event and i will do my best work them into the discussion and one final note, i i understand where cury scheduled to hold the event for an hour. If the quantity of questions is a mini as we expect we may push beyond that time but we will playthings lightyear. But to kick off the discussion, ambassador jeffrey, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with us, and please go ahead. Thank you, charles. Its good to be back at in any i event. We have worked together including unserious act in times past four had another existence. Mei even picture moshe have seen sector estates and secretary of treasurys statements on the caesar act last week and some of the commentaries and fact sheets i wont get into the details. What a want to do is explain why the caesar act is important, how were going to implement it and what the next steps are. Most importantly start with the title, as charles said, it is the civilian protection act of 2019. It is designed to protect the Syrian People from assad in two ways, directly in the introduction by calling on the airstrikes against the same people and then more generally to require participation in the critical process under the u. N. , thats the 22 resolution 2254 process, which is of the american policy and we do not deviate and iota on that. It is not regime change. It is not a a separate deal. It is the human process that were supporting everywhere we can including with this legislation. Its not the first sanctions action against syria. Weve had a set of them, mainly executive but this is important because it is a law. It is a lot of stuff only passed by congress and signed by President Trump, its a law that passed overwhelmingly, almost unanimously in both houses. Thats very important because a reflex that syria policy and the United States today covers all parts of the u. S. Political system, from the right to the left, republicans to democrats, from people who think negatively another things, there is near unanimity on the need to do more on syria. Because this is such a terrible conflict for its own population, the latest statistics ive seen that only a little over a third of the population is the under assads active control. Of the less than a third of refugees in turkey, lebanon and jordan put done an amazing job taking care of those people in some and europe. Almost a third are also in areas outside of regime controlled in the north west and east. That is a telling point and where assad is today. We secondly see this legislation as giving us more powerful tools to go after those cronies and oligarchs were supporting assad and assad and his family themselves, as you see from the sanctions we brought. Those are under the executive order but were going to target these people with the caesar act with anything else we can as part of the package. Our goal is not to torpedo the economy, believe me. Assad more than capable of doing that himself as Charles Lister just explain. Hes doing a terrific job of pushing the pound into irrelevance and undercutting whatevers left of the syrian gdp. Rather, it is to inflict real pain on this people around assad and get them to understand this pain doesnt go away, until they change their policies. That involves either breaking off support for the regime or aa list of seven things the regime has to do for the regime as a whole can no longer be sanctioned. No longer besieged the Syrian People, no longer dealing with war criminals, encouraging refugees to return and on and on. Another thing we expect from the Syrian Government is to stop threatening the neighborhood, be it by allowing or ignoring the terrorist threat that is grown up in that country, charles again mention isis is on the march again in those areas that we dont control. Be it the use of chemical weapons, be it the weaponization of refugees, or inviting an iran with its hegemonic agenda or inviting and russian with an equal troubling agenda. But we have to resolve all of these geostrategic issues as well as the humanitarian issues if we can move forward. Next, the caesar act has strong humanitarian provisions that require us in the u. S. Government to explain to congress and the juror and her actual sanctions targeting the we do not undercut the humanitarian efforts underway. United states will be pledging a significant amount at the eu pledging conference she measuring eight at the end of this month. Already with over 10. 6 billion with the biggest humanitarian contributor. That will not stop drink is covid19 but we will continue the sanctions because of their nature they allow us to do secondary sanctions. They target specific areas. In one sense money laundry, the central bank which is abhorrent although it is always been sanctioned, but also the aviation industry, particularly military aviation, energy industry, construction industry. We want to make it clear for anybody who wants to rebuild assads syria but that cannot happen without caesar sanctions, and to have a political process. Now, what are we going to do with all this . In looking at the larger picture right now, and charles mentioned much of this, first of all we see an economic freefall of the assad regime largely through his own behavior and the collapse of the Banking System in lebanon. Secondly, we see his military offensive has stalemated. In idlib he was stopped in his tracks by opposition counteroffensive. The u. S. Has not left the northeast. The president in his own way in talking about with charles from example in afghanistan a mcclue we would eventually withdraw from syria here nothing is on the table right now. And the third country i mentioned is in many respects the ever more effective, particularly in targeting iranian and threatening syrian targets. So military situation isnt that great. Finally, on the accountability front which is so important in this conflict. We are seeing a great deal of support from secretarygeneral to terrorist who spoke out in written form in his reply to the outrageous and shameful 2504 resolution that cut two of the four humanitarian into syria calling for those corridors or a least one in the northeast to be reinstated and plenty of the obvious the Syrian Government is nothing significant to allow the mentoring deliveries in areas that it does not control. We have seen the board of inquiry called by the secretarygeneral condemning the regime and indirectly the russians for exploiting the passing of information on safe areas that were then subsequently bombed. Weve seen the opcw with it iit condemnation of the regime for three attacks in the spring of 2017 with chemical weapons, blaming not only Regime Forces the same this had to have been a great you an order by the top levels of the government. So thats the fourth thing along with the military situation, the economy, our sanctions and accountability that we believe will allow us to press the russians, our interlocutors, r a negotiated settlement under 20 to 54. Thank you, charles. Ambassador, thank you very much for the opening remarks. I think well go to qutaiba next. Thank you so much for being with us, qutaiba. Thank thank you so much, cha. Thanks for organizing this and for ambassador jeffrey his efforts in the state department to reestablish the commute geisha is an explain what the caesar act is. As you said this is a really important step towards accountability especially for a nation like syria. A lot of people have been forced the conflict inside syria but in reality its been going on for as long as the assad party was established, as long as 1963 was the first when the came into power. When you look at, i look specifically at the site of the syrian have Syrian Regime design syrian laws specifically to funnel all those detainees to a legal system that would put them in prison for use. This is not just a side issue, and organized issue. I think its great were putting this forward towards bringing a lot of commuters of war crimes and crimes against humanity, torture and killing of detainees, and maybe hopefully bring some hope to the families of the thousand disappear. Whats coming ahead of us, there are two challenges. The first one is to control the narrative regarding the caesar act. Again i respect ambassador jeffrey is effort in the last week reaching out to talk about the caesar act and address the concerns serious half of i almost saw him every day last week and addressing the questions. And to listen and to control the narrative that is reaching the Syrian People. Continue to reach out but i listen to syrians and see how the side effects of the caesar act will affect the life of ordinary citizens. Where the two exemptions, this is really important to tell the Syrian People that the caesar act is targeting those who are committing crimes specifically, and not targeting the lives of ordinary syrians. The second challenge is to adapt, to make sure actually that the caesar act and sanctions resulting from caesar act are actually serving their goal, to make sure that we have a very responsible sanction program. If you look at the sanctions program today, almost over 300 individuals come seeking individuals listed on the sanctions list. We have 217 individuals on the research center, working on chemical weapons. We want to make sure that actually the caesar act in effect and were targeting people were behind torturing syrians. We need to really expand and looking to those individuals in every intelligence center, in every government to make sure actually have those individuals, those who are responsible for those horrific acts weve seen. Thank you, charles. Qutaiba, thank you so much for placing that into some very important context. Rime, thank you. Please go ahead. Thank you heavenly and to think of a very good point on which to start which is to follow up with what qutaiba was saying. The narrative is extremely important for syrians to understand why this is necessary and how he could possibly benefit them, but also to counter the other narrative, which is that everything that the regime has done has been to save the country, has been to save syrians, and none of this wouldve happened had it not been for the sanctions. I think its important to remind those people whether they are kneejerk reactions as usual from people who say that anything the u. S. Does must be bad, or they are pure ignorant about what the regime has done. In everything that concerns you and the economy was in free fall. If you had followed, you would have known already that everything done by this regime, from turning a socialist close economy to a socalled open economy, but only for a certain segment of society. So wile they launched into this crony capitalism, no concurrent measures were taken to make sure that the normal economy for everybody else was going on. So that means that people saw subsidies begin to be reduced without something to make up for them. And the subsidies were needed because under the father, for 30 years, everything was told the only way that people could access anything from gas to bread, needed to be subsidized. So i think we really need to look at these issues to understand that even if the sanctions were removed. One day to the next, we would not be getting the normal involvement of a government, of a normal government with the people. I want to also mention that if anybody had been following the Syrian People, its been the regime all of these years. In the lately, its 800 for any syrian to renew a passport. This is not new. Theyve always paid for the privilege of going to syria. I can tell you young men who never lived in syria, but some from syrian heritage and want today visit their country would have to pay 5, 10 or 15,000 to be exempt from the military. This had gone for years. Import fees on cars. Until recently, until 2005 the import tax, the duty was 255 and we can name numerous examples of how it has always been the syrians that had to pay this heavy price to be able to participate in daily life. So, this is an answer to the naysayers who say that the sanctions hurt the people. Im not going to pretend they cannot hurt the people, they can hurt the people and thats why my position when i look at the situation today, is to say that the sanctions alone are not enough, and ambassador jeffrey mentioned there would be political pressure to move on with 2254 and i think that this is the key, the key point that we have to keep on making, that we have these sanctions, only against the regime enabler, but at the same time, there is only one way out of this, and the way, if we dont call it regime change, we can have a political transition, which is precisely what 2254 is about. And finally i would say about the seizures that the regime has carried out repeatedly, not just in syrian cities, but i remind you when the regime had to withdraw very quickly after the assassination in 2005, it imposed a blockade on lebanon. It left trucks for weeks with produce rotting in the sun. This is not new tactic by the regime and really absurd to imagine that all of these ills that have befallen the Syrian People is because of these sanctions. Thank you so much for those really important opening comments as well. I think all three of you have said things that compliment each other but give very important different perspectives or overlapping perspectives. Ambassador jeffrey, i come to you first, quite clearly its no secret to you that the legislation has sparked quite a debate within the community thats following syria and events elsewhere in the middle east. With sort of partnering the debate accusing the sanctions of having an overly negative effect on the civilian population and i think weve all all three of you have addressed why that argument by itself is potentially problematic, but i wanted to ask you about the fact that, you know, sanctions of any kind can have unintended consequences and is there, or are there any other plans of action by the u. S. Government to try to prevent or ameliorate any of those consequences . Theres been talk in Northern Syria in recent weeks talking whether the u. S. Should be bailing out the increased salaries by 150 last week, to make up for the inflation being seen in damascus and thats one example. And the other thing that struck my mind included in the sanctions, engaged in some form of work and dependent 90 on u. N. Financial assistance. Will syria trust essentially cease to exist. Some of those unintended consequences and the perspective from the u. S. Government would be very helpful. First of all, charles, the legislation has very Strong Language and very strong requirements. Humanitarian assistance, we had adhere fully to them. We have no intention of targeting anything that delivers humanitarian assistance anywhere in syria, including regime areas. The first thing were doing, aside from articulating that policy is ensuring that we can make an additional large contribution to the humanitarian needs of syria beyond the 10. 6 billion weve already given and some of that aid, including american aid, flows to regime areas. I want to repeat that. Its not just that we do nothing to stop humanitarian assistance to the areas. We provide aid to the regime areas because we differentiate between aid to individuals and stablization and reconstruction funding that will be exploited by the regime to build their happy holiday luxury resorts for the auto docks on land taken from People Killed or driven away and put in prison. Thats what were opposed to, not humanitarian assistance. These sanctions were announced three days ago, the incredible collapse of the syrian pound and the other economic problem that syria faces, they cannot be blamed on the sanctions. And a look to enhance our stablization assistance, for example in the northeast, their 50 million dollar, actually 54 Million Dollars has recently notified risk on assistance to syria and targeted on minorities and religious groups, but basically it will help the entire situation and were looking at various other options that have not yet public. Finally, humanitarian and if you will, low level stablization activities that could help the people without unduly enriching and empowering this regime even more are among the first thing we would consider were we to see assad and his allies, the russians and iranian, actually embrace 2254, embrace a permanent ceasefire, cooperate with us on going after the real terrorists rather than claiming the population of terrorists aand tacking them and releasing detainees in large numbers. The rushes shuns, iranians and syrians know our agenda and what were willing to do and its up to them to take a step in at that direction. Thank you. Ambassador, thank you. Follow up with another question which seems to have been asked, the u. S. Called for a behavioral change in the regime rather than essentially regime change. But the language in the caesar act is fairly tough or perceived as fairly tough and the question generally asked is, is the regime able to meet the various requirements or demands and still survive . Or from a regime perspective, do the demands still essentially add up to the regime change and what implications might that have on the feasibility of the ask. Firstoff, i know the regime, rather the act justifiably and understandably and commendbly attacks the horrific totalitarian rule of the biggest butcher in the world today, president assad. But nonetheless, charles, those seven criterias that it cysts as getting the regime out from under the act criteria, do not include the demise of assad. They taken together, along with our other policies, mean, and we just read this, a dramatic shift in the behavior of this regime as we have seen seldom in the world, and japan under the same top leadership after world war ii. Those are the kinds that well need to see. Whether that can happen under this leader and the people around him, we dont know. Its a standard. It is consistent, and this is important, with 2254 in the Security Council that passed it. The Security Council is not in the business of regime change at least not anymore given to what has happened to some campaigns that have been focused on that, rather, were focusing on a change of behavior and its up to the syrians themselves and the Syrian People for the Constitutional Committee and through free elections. Its up to the syrian leadership to decide whether they want to do that with the people running the country now or whether they have to go. Its not up to the United States. We just defined and we have full International Agreement in this, even by the russians, at least verbally and officially, for those behaviors. Okay. Thank you very much. And a couple of questions to ask both of you together. And theyre somewhat interlinked. The first one as syrians, it seems that act was not known until the last week or two and obviously theres been a lot of educating ones self in syria what it means, where its going, what its demanding. Your take on how the act has been perceived inside seiyria. Ive lots of different opinions whether its a good or bad thing both in regime and opposition areas and also an extension of that. Having come from syria. How do you think the regime will see this . Does the regime take this seriously . Or will it continue to look at this in the hard faith way that it has to military threats over the last nine years . How do you think the regime responds to a challenge like this . Sorry. And why dont we go the first, we will go in the same order that we started the panel. Sure thing. So first on the first issue, how people are preserving it. To be honest, i mean, there are kind of like depending on where people are, frankly. But to talk about that majority released and so like the beginning of this year. So, its kind of like theres this discovery and at the same time, as they said, the Syrian Government and regime is controlling the narrative on what the act is. Its banking on it to say that all of this economic failure because of the war on syrians in the past nine, ten years, its because of the act. And also, another thing, this is a challenge for the regime itself. Its banking on the act to justify it, because of the commitment of return shah and russia and iran. And a lot of it you see in government and the narrative that is a result of the act and because of the americans reactions. But there are many contracts actually with iranian companies, first to give them access to contracts with Public Hospitals and with the manager of health and at the same time, its actually prevented factories which have been actually continuing to work. So, its kind of pushing the syrian businesses out of this market because iran wants the control of as like so many things in syria, wants the control over the pharmaceutical business in syria. So this is actually really important, again, like we go back to the narrative. This has been kind of like the narrative that the regime is pushing. On the other hand, its related to the syrian doctors are. I think its important that the act included that that will push for to fund and support the efforts. And this should actually include specific efforts that actually organize people who are forcibly by steering the government or other parties and until families figure out the fate of their relatives. If today, if youre talking today, that syrian families have not been able to see for the past four years or do not knowledge for the past four years then we have problems of accountability and we need to address this problem and fund and support those organizations that are acting on the front lines. Lines. I agree with you. And i would add that precisely, this is why all of these exercises by Different Civil Society organizations such as the one on the day after. Why theyre working so hard to continue informing syrians and telling them what potential rights they would have in the transition to democracy. How syrians see it is very important. Those under regime control are still of course, able to see international media, but it is very easy to believe that everything bad that is happening to them is because the world just wont leave them alone and its difficult for them to find proof to the contrary. When the regime says theres nothing we can do, they are against us, they are stopping everything and look at what theyre doing to lebanon as well, because the lebanese are as worried as most syrians are. It is because they dont have another outlet. So, the narrative is important. You know, talks such as the ones ambassador jeffrey are giving are extremely important and they need to be translated by syrians to syria. So theres a parallel thing. Theres fear, but also ignorance because even if they were to go and download the act its difficult to understand the details. How the regime sees it is very different. The regime will try to take you from one to the other and thats the way its always acted so we assume that, you know, those of us who know the regime and has been studying this regime for years, we know that the first reaction is always one of increasing suffering on the people, to show their people that this is what will happen to you, not because of us, but because of the americans, et cetera. So i do not believe that for the time being heres as scared as they want them to be or ready to change their behavior and you have to remember that some of those acts, actions that theyre required to take cost them nothing. Like the release of 130,000 is not something thats going to shake the regime. So they are banking on the fact that desperate people who are looking ahead to the winter and being afraid that while they can eat watermelon and a few fruit right now, will not be able to heat their homes or to have enough to feed their children in the coming months. This is what the regime is banking on. The regime is hoping its population and loyalists will be so anxious for them to attend which is why sanctions alone are not enough. We need education and pressure to continue with 2254. Thank you so much. For those really important answers. I have a few things to follow up with you, but ill quickly go back to the ambassador, first. Ambassador, two interlinked questions coming primarily from the audience. One is what youve likely been asked to m different formats. Is the u. S. Prepared to potentially sanction allies in the region, europe or elsewhere who decide to still reengage financially or engage financially with the regime . Secondly, there was some expectation that some sanctions would target russia, russia seemingly has gotten away by and large from u. S. Sanctions so far since intervening in 2015. Is there on whether youre prepared to face it or not, would there be a plan to target the Russian Defense industry through the act . Thank you. First of all, the u. S. Government does not comment on anticipated or potential or under consideration sanctions because they have not been approved by the entire chain of command and that chain of command in the case of these sort of sanctions goes to the very top. So i cant give you any specifics, what i can tell you is the ground rules. There are two things to remember in the act. First of all, like essentially not all, but most sanctions, they establish the parameters within which an administration can act. Anything that falls within these parameters are sanctionable. Emphasis is the last two syllables of both, which is conditional, you can. And it lists, act does is explicitly as i said earlier, but other sanctions and related legislation, and auditors do it in nifrn ways. Different ways. And an entity to be sanctioned, syrian or somebody elses, a government, an individual or an institution or firm. It has to meet the criteria, which is quite explicit and sanctioning that entity has to serve our important policy goal, stopping attacks on civilians and pushing the regime towards the political process, pushing the regime towards meeting the criteria laid out in those seven subparagraphs in the legislation and thats what well do. Thank you so much. A question for you. You mentioned the phrase Civil Society and putting the act and u. S. Sanctions aside theres about and discussion particularly in europe about alternative policies and one the proposal to engage with socalled neutral Civil Society or Civil Society in regime held areas in a way of assisting Syrian People and admit to the conflict without benefitting the regime. Wonder if you could give your perspective on whether or not whether from a european on American Perspective thats a feasible approach or if its something that prafrankly the regime would be able to take on. Ill start with the last point. Yes, the regime can take advantage of these circumstances and proven it repeatedly. Look at the Constitutional Committee launched in november and will be recorded by the special enjoy. From the regime and from the Civil Society, a large number of the Civil Society members participating in the Constitutional Committee have no choice, but to travel with the regime. And you know, in all fairness to them, no matter what their aspirations are, it is not guaranteed that they can have the free say in what they do. So this is something to keep in perspective. When we look at Civil Society outside of the regime area, northeast and northwest, they have their own issues. Lets not forget there are extremist groups there, but huge numbers of small groups and organizations have been working quietly over the years. Now a third one all over europe because of the large number of refugees. Refugees, who while theyre making a new life in germany and austria and britain and france, also keep an eye on syria because this is a place they want to go back to. When you join all these three together and you put you know, you crunch the numbers you realize this is a huge percentage of syrian society, of the syrian population who is not finding a way to make its voice heard. So, yes, i do believe that there is a parallel way. I dont know if we can call it a track two or if theres a road map for that. In addition to the political avenue, there is a need to involve these people and bigger organization can lead the way in that, and bringing the voices and the opinions of even small these are people working not only on, you know, the profit to democracy and position, but also on the empowerment of women on the idea of citizenship, of separating the state from a number of other issues. This is i think, something that should be seriously considered hopefully by the government who are involved in things here. Great, thank you. I wanted to ask you a broadbased question. Theres been a lot more attention in the last year or so on the issue of justice and accountability. Particularly in terms of new court cases in europe. I think we saw the arrest of a man in germany just today. A former military intelligence doctor who has been accused of crimes against humanity and of course, in terse of the language of u. S. Policy. I just wondered, again, from a syrian perspective what how important is this. Why does it come when it comes now, too little, too late. So important, do you see this going towards the kind of longterm effects that much of the Syrian Community wants to see . I believe its never too little too late. When it comes to detainees, nothing is too late. I know families are looking for relatives to disappeared in the 90s and 80s, some still hold hope that theyre being held somewhere. I think in general, youre talking at least 130,000 people, 130,000 families waiting for those who those relatives who disappeared. For all of these families, theres always hope. The hope today is at least somehow they will be able to know either to know that their relatives by checking the caesar photos or by pushing for some just for what they have been going through for the past 10 years. A lot of times when you talk about the issues, we focus on what they go tloo you. Dissension, the torture itself and in many cases, the killings. But in many cases we also forget about what the families are going through, whether its emotional or legal. A lot of families are talking about people for at least 10 years, families who dont have access to funding or access to inheritan inheritance, even when they know through other dedayneees that their relatives have been killed. And the death certificate the families are living in limbo, and on one hand they now through word of mouth that their relatives are probably dead, but on the other hand they have no clue whether theyre officially dead or not, whether theyre 100 dead or not. So the hope is hopefully there will push the Syrian Government or put pressure on the Syrian Regime, actually, to release at least some information about whats happening. I think for a lot, they still are skeptical about 100 justice and for the past 10 years for the detainees. At least there will be some opening when it comes to those who disappeared, whether theyre alive or dead. Thank you. Scale, the scale of the issue. Ambassador, i have a couple of questions for you. One comes from someone inside syria who has challenged the policy by saying by targeting at least the first transactions, by targeting the syrians relief, youre pressuring people who dont and iu pressing the wrong button. Thats one from syria. And another one from a senior from an opposition figure and shes asked, is it actually possible to measure the effect of our sanctions against the regime and differentiate that from the effects of regime behavior or regime policies, whether it be damaging effects or policy effects. At first the regime, we wanted them know know whatever their motivations are, anticipating in the mass crimes against their own population. To the extent that those motivations involve being welcomed back into the International Community, having candlelight visits to paris and travel to disney world, thats all off and furthermore, what we have seen in country after country is that as part of the motivation, its amassing of huge fortunes and pretty suspicious thats the case with assad and his cronies as well and we want them to recommend nies those fortunes could be targeted in various ways. Thats an incentive for them to rethink their ways. Its also this economic corruption, financial side of what any totalitarian regime, but particularly the syrian one is doing a very, very important. How they exercise control over the people, theyre followers, its not just the top 20, 30 families or leaders. Its the hundreds of thousands of those who bask in the sun of their largess and gets to go in as a minor participant in one of the golf courses. We want them to know theres not a future for them. Not at least into the one they want today plug into. And what was the second question . It was a little bit different. Youre on mute. I have so many questions coming in, i think the second question was how would you go about differentiating the effects, measure the effects. Oh, yeah. In 51 years of doing this in government or as a advisor to government. Ive never seen any kind of policy, however concrete that policy is, bonding hanoi, putting half a million troops into saudi arabia in 1990. What were doing now in syria, which can give you a scientific level answer to that question. Yes, that will lead to these actions or this campaign will produce 21 of the impact that would to x happening. It doesnt look work like that. Look at the situation from assads eyes. What is assad better today than a year ago . The treatment of the and is to ensure that the answer is no and that in 2021, the answer will be further no because thats the only way we can do one or two things. The thing we prefer is to have them change their policies and accept the u. N. Led 2254 compromise process. But failing that, what we want to ensure is that they do not benefit from their war crimes. They do not benefit from their aggression. They do not benefit from this litany of things, since 2011, theyll be mired in this thing and thinking that this is not going to end well. We have one or two alternatives. Theyre discouraged and not able to exploit all that theyve achieved. Thats the worst case scenario. But its better than them doing a victory lap. And sooner or later theyll realize they cannot continue and actually sit down with us. Ambassador. Thank you. I just want to follow up on exactly that point, actually. Which is a question i was going to ask you in a bit, but i wonder if you could expand a little more in any way you can on two things. The u. S. Governments perception or your own perception at this most challenging time from the last nine years and secondarily, how likely do you think it would be and i know there have been some back channel contact with russia the last few months and some of that stated publicly. How would you see the struggling in the last comments with the regime will cause miscow to have a change of heart and treat negotiations in a more serious way . Let me focus on the second one, i think thats more important because it gets to this, again, the whole policy is based on making the other side pay an ever growing cost for what it is doing without achieving final success. If theyre willing to continue paying those costs without a Financial Success because they hope that despite the bipartisan nature of the syrian policy and the vote for, for example, the caesar act. Maybe in november theyll get a new leadership, who knows. not at all concerned at least on syria about a change of policies during administration. I think this is a standard policy broadly accepted. There may be some tweaking, depending whether or not who gets elected. President trump pay President Trump may have a second term. We dont know that. And we went with pompeo, and some of us, and we did a press conference and laid it ut publicly. This is a policy were pursuing and we believe that it offers advantages visavis an allin for the military regime where we do not think that we are going to get international, more importantly American Public support for something that goes on for a long time or some kind of superficial performer signing up to a quote, political process that has no somebody stance to it. Even though we have the constitutional commitment and thanks to some russian diplomacy, we have an agenda and we have a weekend. We did not see the regime take that seriously. We know theyre Going Forward with the elections postponed a bit because much covid and that they can go forward with the president ial elections despite the fact that its clear the u. S. Has a sponsored election and they have no intention of going along with that. Until we see real eagerness. Thats the word i would use, to engage on us. The other thing that character sizes our approaching. Were not saying that assad has to go, but change behavior. Were not saying that the russians have to go. He we want to see the military situation turn to 2011 when there was only one outside force in syria, that was the rush thuns and while we prefer the russians not to be there its not part of our policy to try to get them out. In terms of the unity of the Syrian Government, thats always hard to measure and dealing with the Syrian Government not dealing with them, but following closely what the Syrian Government was doing and you remember in 2007, with the Nuclear Flight on euphrates. I was surprised nobody, but a tight circle around assad know whats going to happen. There are many beneficiaries of what assad is doing. Theres no doubt and they feel fallen a level or a circle of support. His earn sir his brother in the 40th army decision there are some frictions and problems. This is not something that we can claim that really know in great detail, nor is it something that we have hanging our policy on, this kind of regi regime changes from within. And how many times ive been through there, but producing good things for the country and for the international commute. Ambassador thank you so much. A couple of questions now for, somewhat unrelated, but hopefully you can both touch on them. The first one is about the Constitutional Committee which is mentioned in the caesar acts not henningsed, but its related to to the ask. How important how is the Constitutional Committee going. And do you think that sear juns would be syrians. The second question is remittances, thinks for syrians in general, but particularly the caesar act. Would you have concern . Do you understand the con concern surrounding the continued ability of the piaspora and inside the country. If so, what kinds of actions would you expect in this demand. And ream why dont you go this time . For instance, its no importance of what the caesar act decided on. And they were sending those to ma mass cuss. They take the money and the official, thats great. You send somebody in your fami family, and ends up 40. Its not just affecting retid lens or even, you know, whatever one you try to send it, were not managing, severeions were effect. So the Constitutional Committee to be very blunt, i believe the syrians see this as crumbs that were thrown to the Syrian People who were to the federal regime. They were told this is the only thij that you wi thing that youll get support of. Whereas weve accepted the United States, and those allies in the regime as well. And they put it on the back burner and the story on the blackburner. Frankly for most Syrian Ambassador jeffrey was making mention of how many were in the area and twothirds outside of the controlled assad. If we take a simple majority and wont changes happen. Then theres not enough for him to be in power and most haves to be responsible. Whether the father or the son. The father nearly got into a war because of his refusal. And in the credible threat of some kind of actions, lets the syrian troops withdraw, led to withdrawal from the syrian troo troops. To tie all of this together. Its the syrian risk to change regime is still there. We dont talk about it anymore because in 2254 we understand that we have to go through a political transition, which begins with the Constitutional Committee. Now, to their credit, the opposition has accepted that. And are working diligently at putting their beliefs, manifestos, goals, their missions at the table. It is the regime that is finding every possible impediment to get that going and ambassador jeffrey was saying precisely to be able to have their own socalled elections, but i think it is important that we continue on a parallel track. We continue working on the Constitutional Committee, but at the same time, i think it is hard time to put mrirl w political pressure. When i say we are opposed to regime change, i mean by american action. If the Syrian People want regime change and thats what were doing in 2254, then that is their decision. Frankly if whatever the decision is leads to a regime regardless of its leaders started doing things listed in the caesar act and our policy, then we will embrace that regime and our government, what we call it. Its up to the people of syria to decide who will lead syria. Right now they do not have a voice. Our political process gives them a pass to that voice. Thank you so much for making that clear, ambassador. Thank you, i agree thoroughly on [inaudible] i think its really important to be clear with the Syrian People, for example, the laws itself does not individual syrian individual, but private practices, and take champs of sending money to syria. Even though the law instead does not affect syrians, they do their own thing. Actually this is something they need to address and we really need to be i see a lot of questions and a lot of people say what is the affect. I think you need to be honest with the Syrian People. The Syrian Regime is the hijacking the Syrian People, driving downhill and what were trying to do is either stop that bus from going down hid or yank the Syrian People off. Of course, the thing is they turn to 70s, 80s, 90s. The thing is that these are acts as the power tools and even now and then, so far so theyre going to be effected, but the right answer. We dont know what the effects are going to be. We actually dont have the pressures to know what are the syrian Economic Policy even though its cleared its nor are the effects of the sanctions itself. What we can do is actually, and thats what i mentioned in order to have a responsive action, what we can do is actually once we implement it is to look at the effects on the Syrian People and look how things have changed, and correct it whether its the regime. We have to be honest with the people. We dont know unt it coot be to particular the people off the decision. Thank you. Ambassador, ive got a knew questions. Ill start with one which has been related a number of times relating to lebanon. Does the u. S. Government expect or is it prepared to deal with potential consequences on the lebanese, commonly on syrian refugees. And then from New York Times saying that Lebanese Bank put a is there a lebanon angle, consciously or unconsciously to the sanctions or anything that the u. S. Government plans to do to assuage these for the population, but lebanon is mentioned a number of times. First of all, i deal with syria, not lebanon or other countries apart from those countries involvement in syria. Refugees are run area where lebanon has been extremely helpful and we work from time to time on the lebanese government on actions related to syrian, including questions when they should go. Im not looking at any impact on the lebanese economy and i havent seen any indication that anybody else is. I think that this is what the Lebanese Banking has done to itself. Again, the United States is a works closely with the lebanese government on this and in terms of the refugee population, again, we continue to support humanitarian assistance to refugees inside and outside of syria and to the efforts by the relevant you and other International Organizations such as imo and such to do that, ive visited these refugee camps and im convinced all three countries, jordan, lebanon and turkey are doing a good job. I will continue to work with them on those. Of course, there is some impact from the financial collapse of the serbian pound. Were concerned about that in the northeast and indirectly even in the northwest although turkey, as you know, has introduced the turkish lira in as a way to respond to the problems there. So, theres a lot of things that were looking at. This is something as i said, its independent from caesar. We dont think that caesar will augment it dramatically, but its something that we are concerned about. Ambassador, thank you. One other question, theres a bunch of questions that have come in about the central bank and assessments believe it or not its involved in money laundering. The question is whether or not the u. S. Government has come to assessment on that, whether thats still something thats under judgment . U. S. Government has ban cast in the legislation to do that assessment. The assessment is not going to complete. Straightforward answer. Then to a tough question. What if this doesnt work . What if the regime doubles down . What if, as i wrote recently, takes a north korea route and it builds a wall and isolates it from the rest of the world and citizens continue to suffer, but will have no better option. Is the u. S. Prepared whether the administration changes in a few months time or not. Is the u. S. Prepared to sustain this kind of additional longterm policy into the long haul . I wonder if maybe i could get your personal opinion on that. My personal opinion is as follows. First of all, a north korea scenario, i think would be difficult given the relative openness of syria and its population, first of all, to the arab world. Secondly, to the International Community over the past basically several centuries. Secondly, the one charm of north korea is that i know of no country in our entire Regional Security system in asia that wants to be like north korea or wants to have anything like what happened in north korea to happen to it. Its a standing admonition to anybody and everybody, do not go down this road. Now the North Koreans do that to themselves. What is happening in syria is a product not just of the Syrian Government although assad enthusiastically has embraced this approach. Its been facilitated by two outside powers without whom assad would not be in power today, or he would have a different approach to a mass opposition to his own public. They have to decide whether it is going to add to their luster, add to their in essence, its what theyre doing, alternative to an americanled collective Security System by showing the world their product on north korea and the middle east. We think that that will not make them particularly attractive as someone as your new 911 in the middle east. If you call 911, and what you end up with the next syria as it looks today, as you put it, the north korea of the middle east, if you go that route, then we think that their ambitious product to totally change to their favor the middle east because this goes far beyond syria, we havent talked much about that, but thats the reality. They have different end goals, but theyre united in opposing our Current System and your Current System, the people, the regions system in the middle east. And the more attractive theyll have that, its in our interest to make their product, which is assad syria, not to be particularly attractive, not a model for other countries want to have happen to them. Ambassador, thank you so much. So, i think well move towards closing and im going to ask the two syrians on the panel one final question or maybe, you can take your pick between both between two questions. The first one is a difficult one, where do you think we might be six to 12 months from now if, as Deputy Assistant secretary rayburn has suggested were about to enter the summer of caesar sanctions . Where do you think syria will be six or 12 months from now, if thats too tough a question, perhaps you can suggest whats missing from u. S. Government and western or International Policy on syria. What more can be done to further the cause that is already underway, better it, make it more efficient, or even reverse it . Should i start . Sure, please, yes. Go ahead. I am pessimistic that we are or at least im not as optimistic. I dont know if ambassador jeffrey was projecting some optimism that the Syrian Regime does not want to end up like north korea, it does not, but its also got a lot of tools at its hands. I think in six to 12 months if there is no panel of strong pressure or Credible Threats on the regime, we will be where we are today, the regime will never leave. It is a regime that must be made to leave, that must be removed by force, but the point i would like to make now is that we forget who are the allies of the regime . Even if we left russia aside for now. Were forgetting the potential power of the militias that theyve used before. Were talking about hezbollah, talking about a number of iraqi militias. Afghan militias all around the region and this will not be the first time that the assad regime uses his or other small actors in the region to inflame the region surrounding him. When the assad regime is cornered, they will throw fire bombs and poll molotov cocktails and see what happens. They always say when the region is in trouble theres no way of solving it without syria. You have to come back to the Syrian Regime. I believe it will hold on and manage to secure itself. Its only weakness is securing the livelihood of its loyalists of its army and of its own militia. If it can secure those people, it knows full well that the Syrian People, whether they starve or is in despair does not bring much in the equation. This is where we bring back the region and im afraid with only these sanctions as tough as they may be, its not enough to push them over the edge. Thank you. Yeah, i think its easier to answer the second question than the first one honestly. For the past 10 years syria moved all wrong when it comes to expectations and always in a different way. But i think what really happened specifically from policy making perspective, whether in europe or in is to actually move from reactive policy making to [inaudible] we also remember in 2013, chemical weapons were a red line and then it was pushed under the wheels because it was driven. And still today were pushed to see our policies. We dont to whats going to happen in the next year in the United States after election, but what is really important for syrians is for the world and for policy makers to look at them as syrians, not just as a byproduct of iranian. No whaert their policies are with iran, friends with tehran or not, the policies of syria focuses on the Syrian People and not only a group of the Syrian People, the majority of the Syrian People. I think thats what if we can move from the reactive policy theyve been doing for 10 years, proactive policies, i think a lot of things could be better in syria. Thank you so much. Ambassador, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with all of us and our audience. To our audience, thank you so much for a huge number of questions. I did my best to include as many of them as possible into the discussion, but this certainly wont be the last event on syria. I can promise you, there will be many more, so, please keep your questions coming. Thank you so much for being here and lets hope that syria sees some brighter days in the future. Thank you and goodbye. Thank you, charles. Thank you all. Thank you all. The Senate Returns shortly to continue work on the nomination of cory wilson to the 5th circuit courtit
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