E-MAIL THIS LINK
To: 

Russia's Putin Denies Propping up Assad
[An Nahar] Russian President Vladimir Putin
...Second President of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Because of constitutionally mandated term limits he is the current Prime Minister of Russia. His sock puppet, Dmitry Medvedev, was installed in the 2008 presidential elections. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law. During his eight years in office Russia's economy bounced back from crisis, seeing GDP increase, poverty decrease and average monthly salaries increase. During his presidency Putin passed into law a series of fundamental reforms, including a flat income tax of 13%, a reduced profits tax, and new land and legal codes. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile...
on Thursday denied propping up Syrian Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad
Oppressor of the Syrians and the Lebs...
and stressed that Moscow was only seeking to avert a perpetual civil war.

"We are not concerned about (Bashir al-Assad's fate. We understand that the family has been in power for 40 years and there is a need for change," Putin told a major Moscow press briefing.

But he made no call on Assad to step down and said it remained up to the Syrian people themselves to decide their future through peaceful talks.

"What is our position? Not to leave Assad's regime in power at any price, but to first (let the Syrians) agree among themselves how they should live next," Putin said.

"Only then should we start looking at ways to change the existing order."

Russia has remained Syria's main major ally throughout 21 months of violence that an opposition monitoring group said on Thursday has killed 44,000 people.

It scuttled three rounds of U.N. Security Council sanctions against Assad for his crackdown and condemned Washington for recognizing the Syrian opposition as the legitimate voice of the country's citizens.

That position has frustrated Western attempts to end the bloodshed by forcing Assad from power. It has also condemned Moscow's continued military ties with Damascus
...Home to a staggering array of terrorist organizations...
Putin on Thursday argued that Russia's call for dialogue was meant to avert "an endless civil war" between the armed rebels and government forces who still control most of the capital Damascus.

"We want to avoid (Syrian) disintegration," said Putin.

Putin's comments came less than a week after Russia's chief Middle East envoy said it appeared that Assad would not be able to fend off the rebels much longer.

The foreign ministry later denied an official shift in Russia's position and noted that Moscow still recognized the Assad regime.

Posted by: Fred 2012-12-21
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=358443