Assad says no relations with countries backing rebels

Countries that want to reopen embassies in Damascus or resume ties with Syria’s government must end their support for Syria’s rebels, President Bashar Assad says.

“We are not isolated like they think; it’s their arrogance that pushes them to think in this manner,” says Assad in a speech to members of Syria’s diplomatic corps carried on state television.

“There will be neither security cooperation, nor the opening of embassies, nor a role for certain states that say they want to find a way out (of Syria’s war), unless they explicitly cut their ties with terrorism,” he adds.

The United States and most European countries shut their embassies in Damascus after the government’s bloody crackdown on protests that erupted in March 2011. Ties have remained severed throughout the brutal civil war that followed, which has since killed more than 330,000 people.

— AFP