Word: syrian
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...fitting analogy, because like the fictional New Jersey Mob family, the Assads could be facing the end of their run. A long-awaited United Nations report last week implicated the Syrian regime in the assassination last February of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri--and specifically fingered Maher Assad and Shawkat as playing leading roles in the violent conspiracy. The report, by German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis, reconstructs the events that it says led up to the car-bomb murder of Hariri, including the August 2004 meeting in Damascus during which Bashar Assad threatened the billionaire Lebanese politician...
...Assad government has angrily rejected the U.N. findings as baseless, charging that they rest on the hearsay of faithless witnesses, though a Syrian spokesman has also held out the possibility of giving better cooperation to U.N. investigators in the future. But Syria's problems aren't about to go away. Mehlis says he needs two more months to complete his inquiry because of the Assad government's halfhearted cooperation. That charge gave fresh ammunition to Syria's critics in Washington and Europe, who are threatening to pursue economic sanctions against the regime if it fails to make a full accounting...
...much trouble does Assad face? Rice said last week that the U.S., while not currently contemplating using military force to overthrow Assad's regime, does expect a "change in behavior," in particular an end to Syrian meddling in Iraq and Lebanon. For Assad, the risk is that mounting international pressure, perhaps in the form of sanctions, could undermine his authority at home--a thought that has sent Syrians into a quiet frenzy of speculation. What was once imponderable--the end of the Assad family's 35-year hold on power--is suddenly being discussed as if it is a real...
...recent months the President's ability to control events has slipped. Some government insiders criticize Assad for allowing the country to be drawn into a diplomatic row with the U.S. and failing to stop the popular protests against Syria in Lebanon this spring, which forced the withdrawal of Syrian troops. Syrian dissidents are more determined than ever to speak out. Days before the Mehlis report was released, members of 14 opposition parties and rights groups signed the Damascus Declaration, calling for a democratic constitution that would push Assad's regime out of power. The secret police broke up a press...
...many Syrians who have grown impatient with the thuggish tactics of the Assad regime, the U.N. investigation into Hariri's death is likely to stoke more outrage. The report not only provides a rare glimpse into the workings of Syria's police state; if its findings are true, it also makes a devastating case that Assad family members were complicit in state-sponsored murder. The report, quoting an unidentified Syrian witness "who claims to have worked for the Syrian intelligence services in Lebanon," says that senior Syrian and Lebanese security chiefs first decided to kill Hariri last September. A month...