Qatari Amir reiterates political solution to Syria

DOHA, May 14 (KUNA) -- Qatar's Amir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani has underlined the necessity of concluding a political solution to the crisis in Syria.
In the end the solution must be a political one that "achieves justice for the Syrian people who have passed through an unprecedented experience --- because they have dared to aspire to freedom and justice, the Amir added.
This was the core of the Amir's statement to the opening session of the 17th edition of the Doha Forum, themed "Development, Stability and Refugee Crisis," on Sunday.
The war launched against the Syrian people continues to take its toll on them in terms of devastation and displacement, Sheikh Tamim said.
"According to international statistics, the number of Syrian refugees has reached five million since the outbreak of the crisis, while the displaced people inside Syria itself have reached nearly twice this figure," he added.
The Qatari Amir stressed that the increasing conflicts and crises in the world today have led to the displacement of millions of refugees around the world. This means millions of stories of individual and family suffering that are not measured quantitatively; it also means tampering with the destiny of nations and communities.
"What is certain is that this matter redoubles the international community's responsibility and requires further efforts to find just and sustainable radical solutions to these conflicts that bring about refugees and at the same time to alleviate their suffering." The Amir affirmed that the asylum crisis is the product of regional conflicts, civil wars and displacements on racial, ethnic or other sectarian backgrounds, some of which date back long ago such as the Palestinian refugees displacement in 1948 during the Palestinian Nakba (catastrophe), whose anniversary coincides with these days.
He noted that the issue of Palestine started as a cause of people who have been uprooted from their land; other cases are relatively recent, such as the situation of displaced Iraqis fleeing the siege and war, while some of them were displaced on sectarian cleansing background.
Meanwhile, the Amir said that development and stability are "interdependent and intertwined; there is no development without stability, and no stability without development." The absence of development and stability triggers trans-border influx of refugees, therefore national commitment to achieve them should not be separate from the international commitments on this issue, he said.
Kuwait's Minister of Social Affairs and Labor, and State Minister of Economic Affairs Hind Al-Sabeeh, is attending the forum as a Representative of His Highness the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah.
The opening session was attended by of Sudanese President Omar Al-Bashir, President of Mali Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, Lebanon's Prime Minister Saad Al Hariri, and Somali Premier Hassan Ali Khayre, together with numerous officials, businessmen, academics, parliamentarians, intellectuals, journalists, representatives of regional and international organizations civil society organizations. (end) nnd.msa