Speaking to Al-Alam on Monday, Sharif Shehadeh said that, by interfering in Syria’s affairs, Qatari officials want to prove their “service” to the United States and the scheduled negotiation between Syrian groups was canceled due to their intrusions.
“Upcoming talks between oppositions and the Syrian government were to take place in the coming days, but they were canceled due to Qataris conspiracies”, he said.
He pointed to the rising expectations of opposition groups and said, Qatar had discouraged Moaz Al-Khatib, head of the Syrian National Opposition Coalition, to engage in talks with the government.
The Syrian MP said, “There is a simple principle for talks in Syria and that is, no one imposes any preconditions or a certain form of dialogue on the other party. Besides, issues such as national security, sovereignty of Syria and foreign interventions are considered as redlines and are not negotiable”.
Syria has been experiencing unrest since mid-March 2011. Many people, including large numbers of security personnel, have been killed in the violence.
The Syrian government says the chaos is being orchestrated from outside the country, and there are reports that a very large number of the militants are foreign nationals.
Shehadeh rejected accusations about Iran, Iraq and Lebanon’s involvement in the Syrian crisis, and said, “These claims are just tricks for supporting foreign interventions in Syria”.