Topic: Syria
Country: United Kingdom
Delegate Name: Charles Rudner
School: Fishers High School
Topic page: background guide and all position papers All United Kingdom position papers GLIMUN 2011 committees
Concerned over the violence in Syria over the past year, the people of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland has imposed various warnings and sanctions towards the nations undergoing the Arab Spring movement. Since Syria was a colony of France the United Kingdom’s presence in Syria didn’t begin until the late 1940s. Recently though with all of the reform movements, the United Kingdom has increased their interest in Syrian affairs. Finding that the Assad regime has continued for too long, the United Kingdom supports these reforms in favor of developing a functioning democracy that meets the needs of the Syrian people.
With the recent suspension of Syria’s membership in the Arab League, the United Kingdom finds that this is the last possible measure for the Arab League without violence to take against the Assad Regime in the hope that they will stop their military action against their citizens. For the United Kingdom, Bashar al-Assad has killed over 3,000 citizens who seek freedom from a nearly fifty year ban on rights like freedom of speech and press. We, as members of the Security Council must find a resolution to this tragedy.
In accordance with Article XXXI of the United Nations Charter, the United Kingdom seeks to discuss the Syrian Uprising with Representative Bashar Jaafari since any resolution on the topic would pertain directly to his represented nation. During this discussion there should be a focus on the UN’s necessary military involvement with the uprising and the security of the post-uprising government. Although the United Kingdom would support military involvement, the people would find it more suitable to have the peaceful resignation of al-Assad. Throughout the discussion, international involvement not only from the Security Council should be considered especially with committees such as Human Rights Committee.
If this discussion either results without a resolution or is avoided by Jaafari, the United Kingdom finds it necessary to implement an international arms sanction on Syria. The European Union has in fact already place a related sanction on Syria but the United Kingdom finds that if there is an international effort to keep Syria without weapons, the regime will soon be forced into negotiations with their citizens.
Freedom for the citizens of Syria is the Security Council’s primary goal, but in addition to this goal, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland deems it necessary that if there is to be unity after this uprising attention must also be spent on the security of the new government and preventing predominant parties like the Ba’ath Party from controlling the majority of the government.
