The 13th round of Astana concluded its work last Friday, affirming the general line of the Astana meetings, which seeks to complete untying the military knots in order to open the door wide to a political solution.
Many years have passed since the debate over which is first: the political solution or the fight against terrorism. That debate proved to be futile. Subsequent developments have shown that the extremists on both sides, who held up to one of the answers, implicitly agreed to extend the duration of the crisis because of the immaturity of "quelling" [the opposition by the regime] nor "overthrowing" [the regime by the opposition] – as their slogans claimed, at a time when the obvious answer was that the two processes [of political solution and fighting terrorism] constitute one integral whole, and cannot be approached except together and in parallel.
The blockers of political solution, the Westerners and their followers and supporters in the various parties, have been accustomed to be in solidarity with each other along the past bitter years. Their plan has always been to keep the suspended files on hold, while using one file at a time as the main tool for hindering, while pretending to be flexible with the other files.
«According to the materialistic conception of history, the production and reproduction of real life constitutes in the last instance the determining factor of history», Engels wrote in to Joseph Bloch in a letter on historical materialism in 1890*.
In the morning of the 30th of December, 2018, a press release was issued on behalf of the Information Office of the Syrian Negotiation Commission (SNC), protesting against the return of relations with Syria by some Arab countries, calling on those countries to review their positions and asking for their support to stand with the SNC.
The decision taken in the National Dialogue Conference in Sochi to form the Constitutional Committee, was a gap in the wall of the political solution, which the West had to recognize and deal with, devoting efforts to eviscerate the initiative in order to close this gap and return to point zero, seeking to extend the war indefinitely.
The extremists live in a state of reassurance about the internationalization of the Syrian issue. They know, as everyone knows, that the international clash is not only about Syria – though Syria has become at the top of its agenda – but also about a new reformulation of the whole international relations. It is a clash that will not end in the near future, but will take several more years to reach its logical ends.
Today's summit in Sochi [17th September, 2018] between the Russian and Turkish presidents marked an important and significant step forward towards ending terrorism in Syria as well as towards consolidating the political solution to the crisis. The fourth de-escalation zone has gained greater momentum by becoming co-sponsored by Russia and Turkey, and this will help to get rid of the internationally classified terrorist groups more rapidly. This process will take place in accordance with new ways and methods different from what has been followed in other regions, for several considerations, the most important of which:
The propaganda campaign concerning the ongoing preparations for the restoration of Idleb governorate to the authority of the Syrian state, is continuing and expanding under the banner of caring for the civilians. It is clear that this campaign – in which all the forces of obstruction are involved from the United States to its regional allies, to some Syrian opposition forces – aims to prevent the elimination of the Terrorist organization of Al-Nusra Front, and this is meant to perpetuate the abnormal situation in Idlib, allowing Syria to remain hostage to Western countries, their mined solutions and their own reconstruction projects, to try to freeze the status quo, leading to division and fragmentation, blocking any gaining of the antecedent accrued benefits from the path of Astana to go on toward a political solution.
The political developments in the Syrian crisis; the overall reactions and effects that followed during the seven years; and the internal, regional and international balances of forces, have destined the political solution to the Syrian crisis to be necessarily a consensual solution.
