Assad has no reason to step down: Russia

Syrian President Bashar Assad has no reason to step down, a top Russian politician has said after visiting Damascus.

Alexei Pushkov, the Kremlin-connected head of the foreign affairs committee in the lower house of Parliament, said today that, after meeting Mr Assad, the president sounded confident and showed no sign of readiness to relinquish power.

Russia and China have vetoed two United Nations Security Council resolutions condemning Mr Assad’s crackdown on protests that killed 5,400 in 2011 alone, according to the UN.

They have refused to attend today’s “friends of Syria” meeting in Tunisia, where the US along with European and Arab nations are set to deliver a stern warning to Mr Assad.

Mr Pushkov said the event deserves to be called a conference of “enemies of Syria”, saying that supplies of weapons to the Syrian opposition would fuel civil war.