Arınç puts Syria blame on West

PARIS

Western powers are responsible for the rise of radical Islam in the uprising against the regime in Syria, Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç told reporters April 15 in the French capital of Paris.

Arınç said he regretted that the “West” – the United States and European countries – had not delivered arms to the Free Syrian Army (FSA).

Arınç criticized the weak support that Western countries have given to the Syrian revolt. “You have given neither military nor political support to the Syrian National Coalition (SNC). You haven’t shown Syria one one-thousandth of the support that you showed in Libya,” Arınç said.

“If Western assistance had weight, radical movements – such as the al-Nusra Front – wouldn’t have emerged in the battle to topple President Bashar al-Assad,” he said.

Last week, the head of Syria’s jihadist al-Nusra Front pledged allegiance to al-Qaeda, in an announcement which is likely to bolster Damascus’s argument that it is fighting “terrorists” who want to impose Islamic state.

Arınç said Turkey provided massive humanitarian aid, some $650 million in the last two years, to the 300,000 Syrian refugees it hosts on its territory.