KurdistanObserver.com

Facing Threats, Syria Weighs Steps to Rally the Home Front

By MICHAEL SLACKMAN

October 28, 2005 The New York Times

DAMASCUS, Oct. 27 - With the threat of economic sanctions looming over Syria, officials of the governing Baath Party announced Thursday that they would formally reconsider a decision made 43 years ago that stripped hundreds of thousands of Kurds of their citizenship, and would also discuss the prospect of allowing multiple political parties in future elections.

Officials here have for years been promising to resolve the citizenship issue with the Kurds, and to open up Syria's one-party system. But the timing of the announcement on the official SANA News Service Thursday - no matter how vague and noncommittal - may provide an indication of how officials are hoping to manage a political crisis incited by the investigation into the assassination of the former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

"They are trying to create a united front at home in the face of the pressures Syria is facing," said Sami Moubayed, a political analyst and writer based here.

The government had been trying to rally the public by dismissing as political a report by the United Nations prosecutor Detlev Mehlis that named two of Syria's most powerful security officials as suspects in Mr. Hariri's assassination. But all the name-calling did little to calm a jittery public and an increasingly nervous inner circle, which has come to view economic sanctions as virtually inevitable, analysts and people who work with the government said.

Officials are talking about rationing some consumer goods to manage the impact of sanctions, and are considering other measures, like releasing political prisoners or making overtures toward cleaning up corruption, as a means of rallying support, the analysts and people who work with the government said.

The efforts, however, may not provide much of a salve. At least one Kurdish leader, for example, said he doubted the government's sincerity, and viewed its offers as far too little to make a difference.

"If they don't allow for real freedoms and resolve internal problems, the people will not be behind them," said Kheir al-Deen Murad, secretary general of the Kurdish Azadi Party in Syria. "They have to open up the political life."

As Syrians wait to see what fate the international community will impose on this nation of 18 million people, President Bashar al-Assad has remained out of view, neither addressing the nation nor making any public statements. Many people said they have been bewildered by the president's reluctance to step forward.

But analysts and people who work with the government said that the nation's top leadership has been uncertain how to handle a crisis that not only touches on some of the most powerful officials in Syria, but also members of the president's immediate family. Mr. Mehlis's report to the United Nations Security Council this week named the president's brother-in-law, Asef Shawkat, head of military intelligence, and the president's brother, Maher Assad, the head of the presidential guard, as suspects in the killing.

For the president, facing the most daunting political test since taking over after his father's death five years ago, the challenge will be to balance the demands of three powerful forces: the international community, his family and the Syrian public. It was considered unlikely that he would agree to turn over either Mr. Shawkat or Mr. Assad.

Economists have told government officials that depending on the type of sanctions imposed, Syria has enough foreign cash reserves to continue buying the imported goods the country depends on.

"Syria can last for about 29 months with its foreign currency reserves," said Abdul Kader I. Husrieh, an economist based in Damascus, though he said it would be devastating to the economy if oil exports were restricted.

And so with Syrians seeing few options, officials have decided to at least discuss giving in to some popular demands. At a meeting of the Baath Party's Central Committee on Thursday, party officials said that the issue of citizenship for Kurds "would be taken soon" and that the law to create multiple parties "would be present for general discussion as well," according to the SANA News Agency.

Mona el-Naggar and Katherine Zoepf contributed reporting for this article.