Syrian elections

Syrian UN ambassador Bashar Al-Jaafari addressing the press conference

Panel of experts, who observed the Syrian Presidential elections of 3 June 2014, appearing alongside Bashar Al-Jaafari

Yesterday (Thursday., 19 June 2014) at 11am, the Syrian Mission to the United Nations convened a press conference featuring people from the US who observed the recent elections of 3 June. 2 Five minutes into the opening comments of Syrian Ambassador Bashar Al-Jaafari, the UN webcast cut off. The thousands of journalists, political analysts, and others who view UN webcasts each day from all over the world were denied the ability to watch the press conference, and hear what was said.

This is not the first time this has happened when Bashar al-Jaafari is speaking. This occurred on June 7th earlier this year, and on numerous occasions throughout 2013. Reporters at Inner City Press reported that this is not accidental, but was ordered by Michele DuBach, Acting Deputy Director-News & Media Operations.

This comes in the context of other UN harassment of Syria. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon has met with Ahmad Jarba, a leader of violent insurgent groups in Syria, but has refused to meet with Bashar Jaafari. Though Syria pays over $1 million to the UN each year, it is not being treated as an equal member state.

Watch the important, UN Press Conference about Syria, that someone obviously doesn't want you, or anyone else, to see:

Footnote[s]

#fnAbSy1" id="fnAbSy1">1. #txtAbSy1">↑ Examples of msm 'reporting' of the 2014 Syrian elections include: The Clever, 'Democratically Supported,' Bloodthirsty Tyrant (4/6/14) by Daniel dePetris of the Huffington Post, Syria Election: Experts Weigh In (2/6/14) – Voice of America, Landslide win for Assad in Syria's presidential elections (4/6/14) – Haaretz, Syrian election sends powerful signal of Assad’s control (3/6/14) by Liz Sly and Ahmed Ramadan of the Washington Post. (In comparison to the rest of the msm the report in Israel's Haaretz is surprisingly factual and balanced – Ed).

#fnAbSy2" id="fnAbSy2">2. #txtAbSy2">↑ According to the report cited above from Haaretz which can hardly be accused of bias towards the Syrian government, 88.7% of the 73.42% of eligible Syrian voters who voted, voted for President Bashar al-Assad. So, of 15,845,575 Syrians eligible to vote, eligible voters 10,319,723 or 65.13% voted for Bashar al-Assad.

No-one who, elsewhere, chose to loudly dispute the legitimacy of that election could bring himself/herself to show the courage of his/her convictions by challenging the testimony of those observers at that press conference.

What other political leader in the world, particularly from nations hostile to Syria – the United States, France, the United Kingdom, Israel and Australia – can claim to have anywhere near as much popular support as Syrian President Bashar al-Assad?

The legitimacy rightly enjoyed by President Bashar al-Assad dwarfs that that can be claimed by of any one of his opponents: United States' President Barack Obama, British Prime Minister David Cameron, French President Nicholas Hollande, Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu and Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott.