You're reading: Russia, Europeans seek compromise UN Syria draft

UNITED NATIONS, Sept 28 (Reuters) - Russia and Western powers on the U.N. Security Council voiced hope on Wednesday that they would soon have a resolution on Syria that calls for an end to violence without demanding immediate sanctions.

The latest attempt to bridge the wide differences between Russia, China, Brazil, India and South Africa — the "BRICS" countries — and the United States and European members of the council comes after months of resistance by the BRICS bloc of emerging market nations to tough U.N. action against Syria.

"If the council indeed is unified in the need to find a political outcome and stop the violence in Syria, then we should be able to have a common ground," Russian U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin told reporters after a closed-door Security Council meeting on Syria.

"The main thing is not to lose sight of those two objectives — stop the violence immediately and put in (motion) a political process which would lead to reforms and which would lead to a satisfactory situation of the people of Syria."

Churkin said earlier on Wednesday that he had circulated his own draft among the 14 other members of the Security Council, an updated version of a bland earlier Russian text that expressed concern over the six-month crackdown against pro-democracy demonstrators the U.N. says has killed 2,700.

The latest Western draft, circulated on Tuesday by Britain, France, Germany and Portugal, was aimed at breaking a deadlock on the Security Council over Syria caused by the sharp differences between the BRICS and Western council members.

It includes the threat of sanctions if the government of President Bashar al-Assad does not halt military operations against civilians but drops previous calls in a European and U.S. draft submitted last month to the council for immediate sanctions against Assad, members of his family and associates.

That draft resolution was never voted on because of fierce opposition from the BRICS.

Western envoys had hoped that dropping calls for immediate sanctions while keeping relatively tough language would be enough to secure the support of the BRICS for their new draft.

COMPROMISE DRAFT

But Moscow was not impressed.

Churkin rejected the European draft circulated on Tuesday, saying its approach to the issue was "encouraging violence in Syria" and advocating a "clear policy of regime change."

He later softened his criticism, saying that efforts to merge the Russian and European texts were promising.

"We are now closer than we used to be," he said. "There are still some things which need to be reflected on."

The four European delegations on the council revised their draft resolution and planned to circulate it to the rest of the council late on Wednesday, diplomats said. The latest draft retains the threat of future sanctions if Syria does not halt violence against civilians.

"This will not be watered down," German Ambassador Peter Wittig told reporters. "We have some … concessions, but the main gist is kept intact. The threat of sanctions is a crucial element."

Council members plan to meet on Thursday to discuss the compromise draft, which British Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant said he hoped would be "the final meeting" on how to word the resolution. French Ambassador Gerard Araud said he hoped the council would formally adopt the resolution by Friday.

Syrian Ambassador Bashar Ja’afari dismissed the Western push to condemn Damascus as a "diversion" aimed at preventing the council from discussing and approving a Palestinian bid to secure full U.N. membership and recognition of statehood.

Washington is not part of the drafting process, diplomats said, possibly reflecting U.S. concerns that the Europeans may be going too far to accommodate the BRICS.

Churkin has repeatedly cited the case of Libya, where a Security Council resolution calling for protection of civilians led to NATO bombing of leader Muammar Gaddafi’s forces, as an example of how "innocent formulations" can be abused.

Western countries say their approach to Syria is different from Libya and they have no plan to intervene militarily.

Tuesday’s Western draft said that if Damascus failed to heed the Security Council’s demands for an end to violence the council would "adopt targeted measures, including sanctions."

Moscow dislikes that language, along with a call in the draft for U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to report back to the council on compliance with the resolution within 15 days of its approval.

The Russian draft, also obtained by Reuters, contains no teeth according to Western envoys and continues to imply that both sides in Syria were behind the violence, a view rejected by the U.S. and European delegations.

The new Russian draft does, however, call on Syrian authorities to release "all political prisoners and detained peaceful demonstrators."