Ivana Bacik (Independent)
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I thank Mr. Yassin-Kassab for the presentation. He is very welcome.

Mr. Yassin-Kassab offers a bleak outlook. We would all share his distress at seeing what has happened in Syria and as the Chair has said, particularly at seeing the carnage inflicted on the civilian population.

I do not know whether Mr. Yassin-Kassab had the opportunity to hear the exchanges earlier where some of us challenged what we were hearing from the group that was in with us at that point. I will ask him to comment on some of what they said. Perhaps I will repeat what they said and ask Mr. Yassin-Kassab to comment. First, one of them mounted an attack on the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and described it as a one-man operation. Could Mr. Yassin-Kassab comment on that?

Second, they asked about the lifting of sanctions. I, among others, pointed out to them that sanctions had been imposed on the Syrian regime, and, indeed, on Russia also, because of international condemnation of the attacks of the Syrian regime and its Russian allies on civilians, and we had an exchange about that. I wonder whether Mr. Yassin-Kassab could comment on what he sees as the effectiveness of sanctions. Mr. Yassin-Kassab spoke, in particular, on the need to expand sanctions against Russia, in terms of the banking system and exclusion from the SWIFT banking system, and maybe he could say a little more about that.

Could Mr. Yassin-Kassab also say something in response to the comments made by one of the speakers earlier that there is no moderate opposition in Syria? Mr. Yassin-Kassab has already countered that. Indeed, when I was challenging them on that, I put to them that we would be hearing from Mr. Yassin-Kassab and that Mr. Yassin-Kassab had a clear view, which is widely shared in the international community, that there was a clear moderate non-violent opposition as part of the Arab Spring originally, in 2011, that it was the start of the anti-Assad revolution but, unfortunately, as Mr. Yassin-Kassab said, it has been attacked from so many sides since, but notably by the regime, that it is now in disarray.

I pointed out to the speakers earlier that when we had the Russian ambassador in with us a number of weeks ago, he had spoken of local peace agreements being conducted by Russia with moderate Opposition groups around Syria which had led to peace in certain areas. Can Mr. Yassin-Kassab comment on that, and on whether that offers any prospect for any sort of peace to be more widespread?

Finally, many of us have been utterly condemnatory of the Syrian regime's brutality over many years and well before the 2011 revolution, and of the complicity of Russia and of Iran in supporting the Syrian regime. Does Mr. Yassin-Kassab see any prospect for the renewal of the United Nations-led effort to renew political negotiations to end the conflict based on the 2012 Geneva Communiqué and the UN Security Council Resolution 2254? That is one of Ireland's key objectives in Syria.

The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade has been clear that Ireland has been seeking to ensure protection of the civilian population. Indeed, we have contributed €62 million in humanitarian assistance in the past four years. We have been demanding legal accountability for war crimes. In particular, we are seeking to see that peace process restarted and we have been clear that a large obstacle to the restarting of that has been that Assad's regime has sought to undermine every effort to reach a negotiated resolution to the conflict since 2011. As I am a member of the Labour Party, I do not speak for the Irish Government. Ireland has made a clear position that Assad's regime has undermined efforts to achieve a negotiated peace. We put that to the delegation this morning and refuted the delegation's suggestion inherent in much of what it stated that the regime wants peace.