The recent elections of People's Assembly reconfirmed what was already confirmed: the existing electoral system is a system that kills the political movement, incapable of representing society, and is a game in the hands of the financial forces and the forces of the state apparatus.
The political geography and the conflict of human groups over wealth and influence throughout history has imposed on the Eastern Mediterranean region to be always at the core of international events, and an arena of international conflict.
The debate has been getting more heated recently about the different perceptions for the new Syria. What this means with regards to the nature of the political system in Syria, and by implication the nature of the relationship among the three branches of government, as well as the question of the relationship between centralization and decentralization.
Among the six conditions he recently announced, James Jeffrey's third condition states the following: Ending hostile acts against neighboring countries.
Last Wednesday’s Astana Trio Summit Statement included 14 points, and it was distinct from the previous statements with broader coverage of the aspects of the Syrian issue.
Media and political outlets these days are flooded with analyses and proposals that overestimate the rhetoric of "the components", "the majorities", "the minorities", and of finding consensus and compromise between them in the new Syria.
The impact of international sanctions cannot be separated from the deterioration of all economic and social indicators in Syria, as the blockade is a major contributor to the deterioration of health indicators, such as: decrease in the average age, increase in child mortality rate, expansion of undernourishment, and others. The blockade is also a major contributor to economic deterioration based on all its indicators.
Three Aspects: Food, Manufacturing, and Driving out the Dollar
The “security operation to confront speculation”, of which we only saw pictures of accumulated dollars on Facebook, has ended. Following these measures, even though the market price of the Syrian pound (SYP) to the dollar decreased by 30% and the Central Bank price rose by nearly 80%, these two prices have not yet reached one another. More importantly, overall prices, including food, continued to rise, to reach within two weeks an increase by more than 38%. All of this took place before the Caesar Act had even entered into force.
The minimum wage in Syria has become the lowest in the world, when measured in dollars, and it may also be the lowest in terms of its purchasing power. Within two weeks, the costs of the basic food basket became 6.6 times the minimum wage – the latter is approximately 50 thousand pounds! This means that the cost of living for a family of five members has exceeded 550 thousand Syrian pounds, taking into account that food constitutes 60% of the cost of living in the current harsh conditions that constrain spending on other aspects!
The two Syrian Kurdish sides – the Kurdish National Unity Parties, which includes 25 parties, and the Kurdish National Council – announced on the 16th of this month, that they had reached a preliminary agreement after many years dominated by a sort of disconnect between the two parties. There was even a dispute that reached the level of contradiction and an exchange of accusations on many occasions, despite the fact that there is between the two parties, or between major parts thereof, a history of a series of agreements – Hawler 1, Hawler 2, Dohuk – that did not succeed in reaching the desired objectives thereof.
