Press TV has interviewed Redwan Rizk, a political commentator in Beirut, to discuss the recent advances made by the Syrian army against the Daesh Takfiri terrorists.
The following is a rough transcription of the interview.
Press TV: When we take a look at the past month, some serious gains have been made by the Syrian army backed by Russian air power. I would think that one of the outcomes of this would be more political leverage when it comes to the peace talks?
Rizk: I believe this is the only thing that can bring stability and peace to Syria by kicking those terrorists out of the Syrian land and Syrian territories and the international world and most of the countries who backed up those terrorists must realize that peace can only be brought to Syria by cutting off all supplies and support to those terrorist groups because now themselves are suffering from the brutal acts against civilians in Europe especially in Belgium and in France and I believe that those countries now are reconsidering their positions, looking at the connections or just the contacts with those terrorist groups and just kicking off or sacking President Bashar al-Assad is not a priority anymore for them. Now they have realized that Syria had been warning the world from those terrorist groups and most of the countries did not want to believe that because they have different agenda.
Now most of the civilians or the refugee problems also in Europe can be solved only by cleansing the Syrian towns and cities out of those occupiers and the return of most of the populations in previous occupied villages and cities [has proved] that Syrian people can go back to their houses, to their land and live peacefully without need of any aid from any country outside.
So now the problem is very clear that it can be solved in this way. The world must unite against terrorism, against those terrorist groups and now the countries who are still backing up those groups must understand that they cannot keep going the way that they did for the past five years, otherwise they will face many, many difficult problems and that will bring instability to the whole region and could threaten the whole world also because as we know that now London, Paris, Brussels and Berlin are under threat and the groups have threatened that they will act something similar to what they have done in Brussels and Paris.
So now most of the capital cities or major cities in Europe are under threat of those groups. Those groups have benefited from provided shelters by most of the European countries. We are talking especially [about] Paris and London and with the great help coming from Turkey and Saudi Arabia also and being financed and protected and they have benefited from safe passages to Syrian territories in and out, both ways.
So peace talk in Geneva in the future talks must concentrate on how to cleanse the Syrian territories first. Second, that the Syrian people can sit and talk and I believe strongly that they can reach some sort of understanding that how to rebuild the new Syria without any interference from any other country especially the people who just put their fingers in the blood or played in the blood, all lives of the Syrian people and especially we are talking about the [Persian] Gulf region and Turkey as well as some of the Europeans who realized very late that their policies in the region was not fair, was not right and the fire that they have ignited to burn the Syrian people only, I believe now it is burning them and that made them realize that they should strongly reconsider the position and also the vision of the contacts or connections with such groups and the monster that they have created, they realized very late that it went out of control and now I hope that they are not late but I believe that this problem can be solved and the countries must correct [their] position and the understanding of the relations with those groups.