US-trained rebels reject pledge not to attack Syrian regime
Syrian fighters walk out of a US programme to train and equip them to fight the Islamic State group after being asked not to turn weapons on the Syrian regime.
2 min read
The US intended to train 5,000 fighters this year [Getty]
Around 150 so-called "moderate" Syrian opposition fighters have reportedly left a US-run project to help them coordinate their fight against the Islamic State group (IS).
The rebels objected to being required to take a pledge not to attack the Syrian regime with the weapons and training they are being given.
While only 200 fighters had turned up at the training camps in Jordan and Turkey, just 50 remain, according to Ibrahim Hamidi, a correspondent at al-Hayat, quoting Western diplomatic sources.
The $500 million programme is the centrepiece of President Obama's strategy to defeat the IS group, and was meant to train 5,000 fighters this year.
While around 6,000 Syrians volunteered, and 1,500 passed the first stage of selection, only 200 of these had actually started training, the Pentagon admitted last week.
Defense Secretary Ashton Carter told a congressional committee last Wednesday it was difficult to find fighters that are both moderate and willing to take on the IS group as their primary foe.
"It turns out to be very hard to identify people who meet both of those criteria," Carter said.
Charlie Winter, an IS specialist at the London-based anti-extremism Quilliam Foundation, told The Daily Beast: "No opposition group will take kindly to being told that they can only be assisted if they focus their efforts on 'terrorists' and not the regime that got Syria to this position in the first place."
Also talking to The Daily Beast, Mustapha Sejari, who claimed to be the commander of 1,000 fighters, said a Department of Defense liaison officer told him they were given the money from Congress for a programme to fight the IS only.
"This reason was not convincing for me. So we said no," said Sejari.
"[My men] don't want to be beholden to this policy because it can be used against them in Syria - that they've betrayed the revolution and now they're just mercenaries for the coalition forces."
The Pentagon denied the Training and Equip project trainers had ever worked with the commander.
The rebels objected to being required to take a pledge not to attack the Syrian regime with the weapons and training they are being given.
While only 200 fighters had turned up at the training camps in Jordan and Turkey, just 50 remain, according to Ibrahim Hamidi, a correspondent at al-Hayat, quoting Western diplomatic sources.
The $500 million programme is the centrepiece of President Obama's strategy to defeat the IS group, and was meant to train 5,000 fighters this year.
While around 6,000 Syrians volunteered, and 1,500 passed the first stage of selection, only 200 of these had actually started training, the Pentagon admitted last week.
 |
No group will take kindly to being told that they can only be assisted if they focus their efforts on 'terrorists' and not the regime. - Charlie Winter |
"It turns out to be very hard to identify people who meet both of those criteria," Carter said.
Charlie Winter, an IS specialist at the London-based anti-extremism Quilliam Foundation, told The Daily Beast: "No opposition group will take kindly to being told that they can only be assisted if they focus their efforts on 'terrorists' and not the regime that got Syria to this position in the first place."
Also talking to The Daily Beast, Mustapha Sejari, who claimed to be the commander of 1,000 fighters, said a Department of Defense liaison officer told him they were given the money from Congress for a programme to fight the IS only.
"This reason was not convincing for me. So we said no," said Sejari.
"[My men] don't want to be beholden to this policy because it can be used against them in Syria - that they've betrayed the revolution and now they're just mercenaries for the coalition forces."
The Pentagon denied the Training and Equip project trainers had ever worked with the commander.
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