Syria’s Bashar al-Assad refuses to quit
4 March 2013 7:29 AM IST
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said he is ready to negotiate with the country's opposition but refuses to consider stepping down, in a rare interview with a UK newspaper.
Assad offered to hold talks with rebels in a bid to end the crisis on the condition they lay down their arms, but made the distinction between the ‘political entities’ he would talk with and ‘armed terrorists’.
‘We are ready to negotiate with anyone, including militants who surrender their arms,’ Assad told The Sunday Times in a video-taped interview conducted last week in his Damascus residence.
‘We can engage in dialogue with the opposition, but we cannot engage in dialogue with terrorists’, he said.
Assad offered to hold talks with rebels in a bid to end the crisis on the condition they lay down their arms, but made the distinction between the ‘political entities’ he would talk with and ‘armed terrorists’.
‘We are ready to negotiate with anyone, including militants who surrender their arms,’ Assad told The Sunday Times in a video-taped interview conducted last week in his Damascus residence.
‘We can engage in dialogue with the opposition, but we cannot engage in dialogue with terrorists’, he said.
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