Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Aleppo (Agenzia Fides) - "The West always remember not to do unto others what you do not want others do unto you",: with these words, remembering a "motto of the Holy Scripture", Mgr. Joseph Nazzaro, OFM, Apostolic Vicar of Aleppo of Latins, comment to Fides the current situation in Syria, after Kofi Annan’s visit. According to observers, the UN envoy left Syria with no major steps forward to stop the ongoing conflict.
"Neither government nor opposition accepted the proposed cease-fire and dialogue," notes with regret the Vicar. "The fact that the opposition has been led and manipulated right from the beginning, the fears are founded: there are other elements at stake", he reports with concern. According to information filtered in recent days and reported by the media (such as AKI - Adnkronos International), the conflict is also fueled by Islamist sectors of the Syrian society.
The Vicar remarks to Fides: "The West, if it wants to be interested in the Middle East, must include the entire area that goes from the Mediterranean to the Persian Gulf. One cannot consider only dates, events or situations, because this is what a certain Western philosophy wants. To implement social and cultural changes it takes centuries: you cannot expect immediate results, you cannot reason with a purely Western criterion".
Fr. Nazzaro continues: "Why is the respect of human rights applied selectively only to Syria? Perhaps for political or commercial reasons? In many other states of the world, in the same Middle East, the worst abuses occur in general silence. Meanwhile, states that perpetrate these abuses vote resolutions to the UN against Syria. Where is the moral? ", he concludes. (PA) (Agenzia Fides 12/03/2012)
