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US envoy to UN calls for real political solution in Syria

March 4, 2021 at 10:51 am

US ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield at the UN Headquarters in New York on 1 March 2021 [TIMOTHY A. CLARY/AFP via Getty Images]

The US Ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, said on Tuesday that the time has come to reach a real political solution in Syria. She added that it is the only way to achieve lasting peace, stability and security for the Syrian people.

Speaking at an informal high-level UN General Assembly meeting on human rights in Syria, Thomas-Greenfield called on the regime in Damascus to reveal the fate of tens of thousands of detained civilians and return the bodies of those who have died to their loved ones.

“The Assad regime continues to imprison tens of thousands of innocent Syrians: women and children, the elderly, doctors and providers, journalists, human rights defenders,” she pointed out. “At least 14,000 Syrians have been reportedly tortured and tens of thousands forcibly disappeared.”

Earlier on Monday, the UN Commission of Inquiry on Syria released a report which said that the Syrian regime has arbitrarily arrested and detained individuals and committed “war crimes and crimes against humanity in the context of detention.” The report noted that other parties in the conflict have also committed crimes by unlawfully and arbitrarily depriving individuals of their liberty.

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