Putin: West clueless if extremists come to power in Syria

Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the western countries would not know what to do if the extremists had come to power in Syria as a result of their interference. President Putin urged the West to say honestly that it had started providing external support as soon as the conflict broke out in Syria. “How did the terrorist group Al-Nusra Front come into existence there? Even the US Department of State has admitted that Al-Qaeda units are fighting there,” Putin said while speaking at the Valdai International Discussion Club on Thursday. “We can’t watch mass killings calmly, but if we try to interfere on either side, there will be no balance. We must find points of contact and equilibrium that would hold for some time,” Putin pointed out, the Voice of Russia reported. He mentioned Libya as an example. “Has it become better there now? What is the result?” he asked, adding that the way proposed to solve the problem in that country had proven wrong. “This is why we want to forge constructive dialogue with the United States,” the president said. The use of force against Syria would upset the balance of power in the world not to that country, Vladimir Putin said. “This would be a blow to the world order, not to Syria. This is what I mean.” The head of state recalled that the UN Charter had been amended, at the US insistence, to include a provision, according to which matters of peace and war could be solved only unanimously. “There is a deep meaning in this, no matter how hard it could be,” Putin said. He stressed that if any country that feels vulnerable starts delivering strikes wherever it wants, the world order and the importance of the United Nations and its Security Council would be reduced to zero. The call for military action against Syria intensified after foreign-backed opposition forces accused the Syrian government of launching a chemical attack on militant strongholds in the suburbs of Damascus on August 21. Damascus has vehemently denied the accusations, saying the chemical attack was carried out by the militants themselves as a false flag operation. Syria has been gripped by deadly unrest since 2011. According to reports, the western powers and their regional allies -- especially Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey -- are supporting the militants operating inside Syria. According to the United Nations, more than 100,000 people have been killed and a total of 7.8 million of others displaced due to the violence.