PARIS — The United States is looking for more
tangible ways to support Syria’s rebels and bolster a fledgling
political movement that is struggling to deliver basic services after
nearly two years of civil war, US Secretary of State John Kerry said
Wednesday.Officials in the
United States and Europe have said the Obama administration is nearing a
decision on whether to provide non-lethal assistance to carefully
vetted fighters opposed to Syrian President Basher Al-Assad, and Kerry’s
comments indicated that the Americans are working to make sure that its
aid doesn’t fall into the wrong hands.“We
are examining and developing ways to accelerate the political
transition that the Syrian people want and deserve,” Kerry said. “We
need to help them to deliver basic services and to protect the
legitimate institutions of the state.”A
decision whether to vastly increase the size and scope of assistance to
Assad’s foes is expected by Thursday when Kerry will attend an
international conference on Syria in Rome that leaders of the opposition
Syrian National Coalition have been persuaded to attend, the officials
said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because the shift in strategy
has not yet been finalized and still needs to be coordinated with
European nations, notably Britain.France,
Syria’s former colonial ruler, has been among the strongest supporters
of the rebels, and French President Francois Hollande was the first
Western leader to recognize their leadership.“We agree all of us on the fact that Mr. Basher Al-Assad has to quit,” said French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius.In
Vienna, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyib Erdogan said lack of clear
leader among Syria’s opposition is no reason to maintain support for the
“cruel” Al-Assad regime. “The
international community thus far unfortunately has not taken the kind
of position it was expected to take,” Erdogan said at a UN event.“Some
countries ask who will replace Assad when he leaves. I always say that
major events, major revolutions, bring their own leaders,” he said
through an interpreter at a news conference.On
the ground, Syrian warplanes carried out airstrikes on rebels trying to
storm a police academy outside Aleppo, while jihadi fighters battled
government troops along a key supply road leading to the southeastern
part of the city, activists said.Aleppo
became a key front in the country’s civil war after rebels launched an
offensive there in July 2012. In months of bloody street fighting,
opposition fighters have slowly expanded the turf under their control,
although the combat has left much of the city in ruins.The
police academy has recently emerged as a new front in the fight for
Aleppo, which is considered a major prize in the conflict. Activists say
the government has turned the facility into a military base, using it
to shell opposition areas in the countryside as well as rebel-held
neighborhoods inside the city. — Agencies
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