The reactionary character of the Syrian National Council is pretty open and blatant, as is its Pentagon backing. Take a look at their spokewoman, Bassma Kodmani, who is posturing herself off all over the media today just like a little Hillary Clinton clone should do. Her message to the Syrian government? …’we gonna send in guns that are big big big, and never mind what the UN is doing.’ She is telling us all that the US government and its allies are her sponsors and her BIG guns, if you only read through the lines of her press conferences some. Putin is able to do that. Are you?
And here following is an excerpt from the wikipedia info about who she is and her background in being a counter-revolutionary in the pay and sponsorship of the US government…
‘The Arab Reform Initiative
In 2005, Bassma Kodmani established the Arab Reform Initiative (ARI), a consortium of independent Arab research and policy institutes, with partners from the United States and Europe. The Arab Reform Initiative had been established by the Council on Foreign Relations, a highly influential think tank and lobbying group in the United States, that promotes market liberalization and global governance.[8]
Through policy recommendations and research, the ARI has the stated aim of promoting reform and democratization in the Arab world. It hopes to initiate a dialogue between policy institutes in the Arab world in order to “advance the understanding of western different groups on issues of reform in the Arab world.” In addition, the Arab Reform Initiative “aims to raise awareness in the Arab world about successful transitions to democracy in other parts of the world, and of the mechanisms and compromises which made such successful transitions possible.”[10]
The initiative is based on three main principles:
“1- The Arab world needs to develop its own conception of reform, based on its present realities and rooted in its history. While there are basic universal criteria that apply to a process of democratic reform in any given society, the initiative seeks to generate knowledge by those who are the prime targets of reform.
2- Reform is a comprehensive process which can only succeed if the interaction between the political, economic, societal and cultural spheres is fully recognized. In the quest to build free, just and democratic societies, the initiative privileges issues of democratization and good governance, socio-economic and cultural transformations, and social justice.
3- The network’s conception of reform fully recognizes that Arab countries present very diverse situations and that this diversity is likely to become more salient as societies engage in a path of liberalization. Thanks to its composition, with member institutes and scholars from all countries of the region, the initiative is well positioned to produce analyses and recommend diverse solutions relevant to the specificities of each society.” [10]
The ARI network includes the following members: the Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy (ELIAMEP), the European Institute for Research on Euro-Arab Cooperation (MEDEA), the European Institute for Security Studies, the Center for Strategic Studies, the Fundacion Para Las Relaciones Internacionales y El Dialogo Exterior, the Sudanese Studies Center, the The Arab Reform Forum, the US/Middle East Project, Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies (ACPSS), the Centre for European Reform, the King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies, the Lebanese Center for Policy Studies, the Gulf Research Center and the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research.’
Read more at wikipedia on Bassma Kodmani ___ and at Bassma Kodmani’s own Council on Foreign Relations project site in the Arab World at Arab Reform Initiative.
