Brahimi to be new Syria envoy

UNITED NATIONS: Lakhdar Brahimi, a veteran diplomat and former Algerian foreign minister, is expected to be named as the new UN-Arab League envoy to Syria in place of Kofi Annan, diplomats said Thursday.

Negotiations are still going on over the envoy's role and how the United Nations will operate in Syria amid the intensifying civil war. The mandate of the UN mission in the country ends on August 20.

An official announcement of the appointment of the 78-year-old Brahimi is expected to be made early next week, diplomats said, speaking on condition of anonymity as talks continue.

“We are certain it will be Brahimi,” said one UN diplomat. “He is the choice of the UN secretary general and his name will be announced next week as long as he does not pull out,” added another.

Annan, a former UN secretary general, said he is leaving because of the lack of international support for his efforts to end the 17-month Syria conflict, in which rebels say more than 20,000 people have been killed.

He is to carry on working until August 31. Brahimi was the UN envoy in Afghanistan after the September 11, 2001 attacks and in Iraq after the 2003 US-led invasion.

Brahimi was Algerian foreign minister from 1991 to 1993, and he helped end Lebanon's civil war in the late 1980s as an Arab League envoy.

With the failure of Annan's six-month campaign to get Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to carry out his six-point peace plan, there is now debate among key players over the role of the new envoy. Annan and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon have made it clear that they believe divisions among the major powers on the UN Security Council undermined the Annan plan.

“I think there are different models for what an envoy might look like, what kind of background, what kind of role,” US ambassador Susan Rice told reporters on Thursday without mentioning who Annan's replacement might be. “We are open-minded about that.

I think we have to be realistic that it is a very difficult job, and Kofi Annan did it admirably and found himself understandably frustrated at the end,” Rice added. A UN diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the Security Council now has to decide whether to stick with Annan's plan. AFP