Syria tells Arab League to head for UN ‘or moon’

Gulf Arab states withdrew their observers from Syria after it rejected an Arab League peace plan stipulating that President Bashar al-Assad surrender power, and the group’s chief called for UN help in ending Syria’s bloody upheaval.

Syrian foreign minister Walid al-Moualem accused the League of plotting to engineer foreign intervention in the crisis, in which thousands of civilians and members of security forces have been killed in a 10-month-old uprising against Assad.

“Definitely the solution in Syria is not the solution suggested by the Arab League, which we have rejected,” Moualem said. “They have abandoned their role as the Arab League and we no longer want Arab solutions to the crisis.

“Heading to the [UN] Security Council will be the third stage in their plan, and the only thing left is the last step of internationalisation,” he told a news conference in Damascus.

“They can head to New York or to the moon. So long as we are not paying for their tickets, it is none of our concern.”

With Damascus obdurate, Arab League chief Nabil Elaraby and Qatari prime minister Hamad bin Jassim al-Thani, who heads the League’s committee on Syria, had sent a joint letter to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon giving details of the organisation’s latest plan for a political solution in Syria.

The letter asks for a “joint meeting between them in the UN headquarters to inform the Security Council about developments and obtain the support of the Council for this plan”.

An ambassador to the League said that bringing in the Security Council could trigger tougher measures if Assad fails to comply with the plan.