KHADDAM INTERVIEW CONTINUES TO PROVOKE ANGRY

C O N F I D E N T I A L DAMASCUS 000019

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

PARIS FOR ZEYA; LONDON FOR TSOU

E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/12/2015
TAGS: PGOV PREL SY
SUBJECT: KHADDAM INTERVIEW CONTINUES TO PROVOKE ANGRY
REACTION IN SYRIA


Classified By: Charge d'Affaires Stephen A. Seche, per 1.4 b,d.


1. (SBU) The December 30 interview that former Syrian VP
Abdul Halim Khaddam granted to the al-Arabiyya TV network has
provoked a torrent of denunciation and anger in Damascus.
The People's Assembly held a special session the following
day -- televised live on Syrian TV -- to allow a parade of
parliamentarians to criticize Khaddam's disloyalty and to
call for his trial in absentia on charges of treason. MP's
also accused him and his family of corruption. (Note:
Syrian media used voice-over commentary to effectively censor
a call by moderate Islamist MP Mohammed Habash for the
government to release imprisoned Damascus Spring detainees,
including MP's Riyad Seif and Ma'moum Homsi. Habash accused
Khaddam of having been instrumental in the decision to have
them imprisoned.)


2. (SBU) Media accounts report that the National Command of
the Ba'ath Party voted January 1 to expel Khaddam from its
ranks. There were also reports that an angry mob tried to
burn down Khaddam's hometown residence in the coastal city of
Banyas and that security forces raided the offices of his
son, Jihad Khaddam, in the Damascus suburb of Mezzeh. (Note:
All three of Khaddam's sons are now in Paris, the last one
having departed Syria three days before the interview,
according to media contacts.)


3. (SBU) A statement in the official Syrian Press Agency
(SANA) January 2 called Khaddam "a joiner to the chorus of
those hostile to Syria," noting that his remarks made him a
part of the "U.S.-Israeli scheme that aims at striking
Syria's steadfastness." The statement also accused Khaddam --
contradicting his own assertions to the contrary -- of having
been an Old Guard obstructionist, consistently opposing
reform and modernization in Syria when he was in power.


4. (SBU) The privately run Syrian news websites Champress
and Syrianews, both generally pro-SARG, posted scores of
anonymous commentaries, most of them fulminating against
Khaddam's hypocrisy, corruption, and feeble attempts to
portray himself as a political and economic reformer thwarted
by others, including Bashar al-Asad. A few accounts stated
that Khaddam had said the right things for the wrong reasons.



5. (C) Comment: Khaddam's controversial interview certainly
caught the regime's attention and became the talk of the town
over the long holiday weekend. Many debated his motives for
making what are viewed here as extremely provocative
comments, wondering if he is trying to re-position himself
for some kind of unlikely political comeback. While much of
the interview is in fact balled up in long historical asides
typical of Ba'athist politicians, Khaddam grated on regime
raw nerves in saying that Bashar al-Asad had addressed
Lebanese PM Hariri in a highly threatening manner months
earlier than previously thought. He also likely angered the
SARG with his crafty hints of Syrian involvement in the
killing, even as he repeatedly insisted that he did not want
to make accusations while the investigation was ongoing. His
pointed remarks on inner circle, Asad family corruption also
pressed very hard on an extremely sensitive nerve. Finally,
his efforts to portray Asad as an overly emotional and
incompetent decision-maker (for his "wrong assessments of
U.S. policy" and his mistakes in Lebanon) and as the real
obstructionist to reforms (that Khaddam says he tried
repeatedly to champion) must have infuriated and embarrassed
the regime. It is unclear if his interview is somehow
connected to UNIIIC's reported request to question Khaddam,
FM Shara'a, and, according to a Reuters account, Asad
himself.
SECHE