BEIRUT: Syrian President Bashar Assad gave a speech Monday, three months into popular unrest against his 11-year rule, in which he promised to hold a national dialogue but blamed the unrest on a foreign conspiracy carried out by saboteurs and extremists.

Following are the highlights of the speech given at Damascus University.PROMISED REFORMS
NATIONAL DIALOGUE: “The committee does not hold dialogue, it presides over dialogue. It has decided to hold a consultative meeting in the next few days and will invite over a hundred personalities to discuss with them the criteria and mechanisms, and after that dialogue will begin immediately.”
“A schedule will be set that says the time for dialogue will be a month or two depending on what the participants decide in the consultative meeting.

“This dialogue is an important issue to which we must give a chance because all of Syria’s future, if we want it to be successful, has to be dependent on this dialogue in which all different parties on the Syrian arena will participate.”
 
POLITICAL LEGISLATION: “If we complete the Parties law and the Elections law – the most important legislation in political reform – we can immediately start national dialogue, which will discuss all of these laws.”
 
PARLIAMENTARY POLLS: “The parliamentary elections, if they are not postponed, will be held in August. We will have a new Parliament by … August and I think we can say that we are able to accomplish this package [of reforms] … in September, this package will be complete.”
 
EXTENDING AMNESTY: “I will ask the Justice Ministry to conduct a study on extending the parameters of the amnesty, even if it’s in another decree.”
 
MUSLIM BROTHERHOOD: “There are several issues dating back three decades during the confrontation with the Muslim Brotherhood, this black period in the ‘80s. There are still new generations paying the price for this period – not having jobs, not given security permits for different purposes.”
“We cannot live for more than three decades in this black period.”
 
TACKLING CORRUPTION: “It is important to work quickly to reinforce institutions with advanced laws and with executives who have responsibilities rather than just a position or a chair.”
“A committee has been formed to prepare legislation and mechanisms to combat corruption with the aim of isolating it and turning it into a rarity rather than a common phenomenon.”

NATURE OF UNREST

POLITICAL SOLUTION: “The solution is to solve the problem with our own hands.”
“What do we say about these political positions? About the pressure from the media, the advanced telephones that we started seeing spreading in Syria in the hands of saboteurs, the fabrications? We cannot say these are acts of goodwill, this is definitely a conspiracy.”
“There is no political solution with those who carry guns and kill people.”
 
SABOTEURS/GUNMEN: “In some cases, peaceful marches were used as a shroud beneath which gunmen hid, and in other cases they were used to carry out attacks on civilians, police and soldiers.”
“What is happening today has nothing to do with development or reform. What is happening is sabotage.”
 
PROTESTERS: “We have to distinguish between them [protesters, and others who have legitimate demands] and saboteurs. The saboteurs are a small group that tried to exploit the kind majority of the Syrian people to carry out their many schemes.”
 
EXTREMISM: “Those are [people] characterized by having extremist and “takfiri” way of thinking … Today, the creed we see [among those people] is not different from what we saw decades ago … He sows destruction under the name of reforms and spreads chaos under the name of freedom.”

CONSEQUENCES OF UNREST

GOING AFTER SABOTEURS: “We will work on chasing down and holding to account everyone who spilled blood or sought to spill it.”

DEPRESSED ECONOMY: “It is important now to work together to restore confidence in the Syrian economy. The most dangerous thing we face in the next stage is the weakness or collapse of the Syrian economy, and a large part of the problem is psychological.”
 
REFUGEES: “I call on each person or family who left their city or village to come back as soon as possible, and I affirm the support of the Syrian government for the people who left Jisr al-Shughour and the surrounding villages to Turkey.”
“There are those who give them the impression that the state will exact revenge, I affirm that is not true. The army is there for security.
 
SUPPORT FOR ARMY: “The most important point is for life to go back to normal even if this crisis or another one lasts for months or years, we have to adapt to it and contain it for it to be a limited crisis.