China can play ‘active Syria role’ - Brahimi

CHINA: UN-Arab League peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi said Wednesday he hoped China would play an active role in helping end the violence in Syria as he met Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi for talks in Beijing.

Greeting Yang at the Foreign Ministry in front of reporters, Brahimi said he hoped “China can play an active role in solving the events in Syria” without elaborating further.

China is generally suspicious of intervention in the internal affairs of other nations.

Both China and Russia have exercised their veto in the UN Security Council to block resolutions aimed at putting more pressure on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Meeting him on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York last month, Yang reaffirmed this stance, saying that “political dialogue is the only correct way to tackle this issue”.

Any political transition must be led by the people of Syria and not imposed by outside forces, he said.

Yang thanked Brahimi for his work on Wednesday and said he hoped their discussions -- their third in two months -- would promote “mutual understanding” and “the appropriate handling of the Syrian issue”.

Yang also met the Syrian president’s envoy in August and an opposition delegation the next month, both times stressing the need for dialogue, the foreign ministry said on its website.

He warned the opposition about outside forces directing any political transition, while he told the president’s envoy that both sides in the conflict should work with international mediation efforts. AFP