Arab Council backs right of Syrians to determine their future

ISTANBUL (AA) – The Arab Council on Thursday reiterated full support for the right of the Syrian people to determine their future.

The human rights body made the commitment on the occasion of the 11th anniversary of the Syrian revolution, which began in March 2011 when popular protests demanding the departure of President Bashar al-Assad were repressed militarily, plunging the country into a devastating civil war.

The anniversary comes "amid the continuous collapse of the living, economic and security conditions of the Syrian people,” Moncef Marzouki, the council’s chairman, said in a statement.

Marzouki, a former president of Tunisia, decried the situation of millions of Syrians who remain “scattered in refugee camps, exile, and prisons” and continue to be “exposed to the most dangerous and dirtiest war of extermination during the past decades."

He stressed the council’s “full support for the right of the Syrian people to determine their future, to get rid of dictatorship, and to (their right to) freedom, dignity and sovereignty,” and called on all Syrians to "adhere to the eternal principles and values of their revolution."

The former Tunisian leader also urged the international community "to end the refugee crisis and enable all Syrians to return to their cities and homes without fear of reprisals or vengeance."

*Writing by Ibrahim Mukhtar