By Lauren Williams

ISTANBUL: Special joint envoy on Syria Kofi Annan is under pressure to set a deadline to implement a political peace plan at the United Nations as foreign ministers meeting in Istanbul signaled the time for diplomatic efforts to resolve the Syrian crisis may have run its course.
 
Tough talk was matched with pledges of assistance to opposition rebel forces to try to topple Syrian President Bashar Assad from Western and Arab diplomats attending a ‘Friends of Syria’ meeting Sunday, but uncertainty and divisions remain over key issues of arming the opposition and state intervention in the crisis.
 
Publicly the ‘Friends’ group of 83 countries uniformly endorsed the Annan effort, conditionally agreed by Assad last Tuesday, which calls for immediate cease-fires, withdrawal of military forces from population centers, humanitarian aid access and dialogue with opposition groups. But states expressed deep misgivings about the likely success of the deal, largely dismissed as a ploy by Assad to buy more time.
 
The Friends meeting urged Annan, who will brief the U.N. Security Council Monday on his efforts to calm a conflict in which in excess of 9,000 people have been killed, to set a timeline for “next steps,” suggesting states must return to the U.N. Security Council should the initiative fail.
 
Annan, who declined an invitation to attend the meeting citing other commitments, won key support from Russia and China, who had vetoed two previous U.N. Security Council resolutions, to secure the Council’s endorsement of the non-binding statement. Russia and China and Syrian ally Iran did not attend the Istanbul meeting.
 
In his opening address to the conference, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey did not aim to “interfere in the domestic policies of other countries,” but made his clearest reference to date that military options might have to be considered if Syria does not cooperate with Annan’s plan and the U.N. Security Council fails to issue a united resolution.
 
“If the U.N. Security Council fails once again to bring about its historic responsibility, there will be no other choice than to support the Syrian people’s right to self-defense,” he said.
 
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton echoed that sentiment, saying while she “did not wish to prejudge [the plan]” from “an experienced negotiator,” she doubted Assad’s willingness to abide by it.
 
“There is no more time for excuses or delays,” Clinton told reporters.
 
“This is a moment of truth.”
 
Stepping up ground support, she said Washington will provide an additional $12 million in technical and communications equipment to help anti-government activists in Syria organize, document atrocities and evade regime attacks, in addition to adopting more targeted sanctions.
 
Meanwhile, the Syrian National Council announced Gulf states would supply millions of dollars to pay salaries to soldiers who defect from Syria’s army.
 
“The SNC will take charge of the payment of fixed salaries of all officers, soldiers and others who are members of the Free Syrian Army,” SNC President Burhan Ghalioun told the conference.
 
The Friends meeting also recognized the Syrian National Council as “a legitimate representative of all Syrians” and “the leading interlocutor of the opposition with the international community” in a final communiqué, after the SNC presented a covenant outlining internal reform and a vision for a transition to democracy. SNC officials had hoped to convince international powers they had overcome internal disputes to gain recognition as the sole legitimate representatives of Syria.
 
Just what these ultimatums mean in real terms remains to be seen. The international community is still divided over whether and how to arm rebel forces amid concerns over deepening sectarian divides in the country and regional political agendas.
 
After a closed-door meeting with Clinton, a leading dissident in exile, Souhair Attassi, told The Daily Star, “They are calling for the opposition to unite, but they aren’t united themselves.”
 
Sunni Gulf states Saudi Arabia and Qatar voiced strong support for arming the rebels, with Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal Saturday, describing arming the Syrian opposition as a “duty.”
 
Iraq’s Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, struck out at that stance Sunday, rejecting “any arming [of Syrian rebels] and the process to overthrow the [Assad] regime, because this will leave a greater crisis in the region.”
 
“The stance of these two states is very strange,” he said, in apparent reference to Qatar and Saudi Arabia, adding a prediction that Assad will hang on to power.
 
“It has been one year and the regime did not fall, and it will not fall, and why should it fall?” he told reporters.
 
The U.S., meanwhile, fears arming the rebels may incite civil war and that weapons may end up in the wrong hands.
 
Responding to questions on how technical support for the SNC would be applied, Clinton told reporters: “We are going to be supporting the SNC with direct assistance in areas such as communications.”
 
“Others are going to be supporting fighters associated with the SNC, so countries are making their own decisions, but the net result is that the SNC is being treated as the umbrella organization representing the opposition,” she said.
 
The Wall Street Journal meanwhile Friday reported that Saudi Arabia was pressuring Jordan to open its borders to allow weapons to reach Syrian rebels, in exchange for economic assistance.
 
A source privy to the negotiations told The Daily Star logistical considerations for how to arm the rebels was still uncertain, but that states’ support was needed.
 
“We need state support to transfer arms, but the U.S. is blocking the arrangement [with Jordan],” the source said, adding that Turkey’s Erdogan “gave assurances words would be followed with actions” in the days after the conference.
 
Speaking at the conference, senior fellow for regional security at the International Institute for Strategic Studies Middle East, Emile Hokayem said the gathering had shown participants “how little agreement there really is on the fundamental issues.”
 
He said the U.S. and others “have committed to [the Annan plan] because they don’t have a better option,” adding, “there is no consensus on the most fundamental issues on arming, and on whether or how to intervene.”
 
He said talk of Gulf armament should be met with caution.
 
“The Gulf states talk tough, but they don’t really know how to run these kind of operations,” he said. “They want to subcontract these operations ... which is not reassuring to other states.”
 
Foreign Affairs liaison and member of the SNC general secretariat Hassan Hashemi was confident the meeting could be interpreted as a genuine threat of action. “We heard today that Erdogan is open to all possibilities now.”
 
“I think we will see things develop very quickly from here, but we have to give due diligence to the Annan plan first.”