Live now is Robert Ford, he was the last US ambassador to Syria, who left the country and in 22 years the violence had escalated significantly. We just heard an excerpt of an interview with the head of HTS, Algie Loni, on No Courage Day. He said their stated goal in all of this is not just clear. It is to take over Aleppo, then weapons and then in August they are trying to make their way into Damascus, they have the hammer as well. But their goal is actually to overthrow the Assad regime, give us your opinion on whether they can actually do that, is this the window of opportunity they have been waiting for for at least eight years.
Firstly, they have always had that goal. They have never changed their goal, never wavered in that second, I think that is what we are seeing in Syria. That is the most serious challenge during the entire twelve years of the Syrian civil war. The most serious challenge to the outside government’s control over the country i have ever seen before. I have the Syrian armed opposition. Which controls the whole of Aleppo, Hama ah and the eastern part of Spur and at the same time government control in parts of the country looks very unstable but the future of Syria and the end of the civil war it is still very much in question. Mr. Ambassador, the main regional beneficiary of all this appears to be Turkey. Just today to confirm that President Erdoğan said he hopes the Syrian rebels will advance without casualties or difficulty, he is doing so at a time when he is trying to limit the influence of Russia and Iran in Syria, but do you know.
We cannot risk further instability on our border. I think you have hit the nail on the head, the Turkish government very much wants the Syrian refugees in Turkey, there are four million of them, they want the very large number of them to leave Turkey and return to their homes in Syria if Aleppo stays calm and secure then hundreds of thousands or more Syrians severely displaced from Aleppo the second-largest city can go home, which will be a huge play for the president and his government, if the fighting continues in and around Damascus, which is still paying off, it will delay the return of other Syrians, if homes fall again.
Hundreds of thousands of Syrian refugees will be able to return to their homes, if it stays secure and stable, the Assad regime has been in power I think for more than five decades since nineteen seventy and the regime has this to maintain its grip on power that it does really brutal things. That includes killing thousands or hundreds of thousands of civilians, obviously, you know displacing millions of people in Syria, just a strategic interest in terms of the US, whether you have a side and power, whether you have HTS and the Terror, that is the lesser of two evils for the US, right since it is hard to say what is best for US interests, obviously the United States has an extremely difficult relationship with it.
The losses of Bush or the previous government in years like Bush or the government for example ten years ago fifteen years ago facilitated the movement of jihadists who were killing American soldiers. Also, Iraqi civilians and soldiers and also to cover up what Lonnie had ties to the Islamic State, it seems he has ended those ties, he is now acting in a more moderate way, but in a way he is an unknown figure among the Syrian people. Along with the international community I think the best thing the Americans can do right now is to work for a ceasefire and a peaceful transition to a new Syrian government negotiated by the Syrian people. When you look at what we heard in this interview or in this exclusive interview with our Jamaat of Karachi and Shaiwal Alawi, they have said two things, they said their Syrian regime is now dead.