Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I agree with the points made by Deputy Ann Phelan. The escalating conflict in Syria has cost more than 60,000 lives, has driven hundreds of thousands of people out of both their homes and their country and has destroyed the livelihoods of innumerable citizens. I understand that 2 million Syrians have been displaced internally and a further 2 million require urgent humanitarian assistance. These figures alone attest to the awfulness of this situation.

The appalling human cost of the conflict has horrified Irish people in recent months. We have witnessed barbaric scenes of bombings and executions on our television screens. It is all too clear that the regime of President Assad has lost its legitimacy and is utterly bankrupt. The exploitation of the conflict as a proxy war by Saudi Arabia and Iran in their efforts to control the Middle East, and, at a higher level, the utter intransigence of certain UN Security Council powers - namely, Russia and China - in the context of ensuring that this problem will be addressed present a serious diplomatic difficulty.

There are three issues that need to be addressed from an Irish perspective. The first of these is the provision of immediate aid to address the humanitarian and refugee crisis in surrounding countries. I warmly welcome the Government's pledge of almost €5 million, in addition to the provision of humanitarian aid, to address the deepening crisis. It is vital that we continue to ensure our aid is targeted at those areas where it is most needed. The second issue that must be addressed relates to the need to identify the support we can provide to the rebel groups. This should be done at EU level. I appreciate that we must tread carefully in pledging support to unknown rebel groups. The Arab Spring has riled the Middle East and we have witnessed the whiplash of armed extremism in Libya. The third issue relates to the diplomatic efforts at UN level to arrive at a feasible plan to bring the civil war in Syria to a close and ensure the transition of power to democratic institutions. The European Union should use its clout to pressurise Russia and China to abandon their zero-sum approach to the awful conflict. There is too much at stake in respect of this extremely serious issue for anyone to be allowed to play politics with it.

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