The European Union tightened sanctions against Syria’s energy and financial sectors on Thursday in order to punish President Bashar al-Assad’s regime for its crackdown on dissidents, diplomats said. EU foreign ministers adopted bans on exporting gas and oil industry equipment to Syria, trading Syrian government bonds and selling software that could be used to monitor Internet and telephone communications.
Meanwhile , Arab League chief Nabil al-Arabi rejected any foreign intervention in Syria on Thursday as he joined European Union talks aimed at ramping up pressure on the regime over its crackdown on dissidents. “We reject any accusation that the Arab League is inviting any intervention,” Arabi said on arrival for a lunch with EU foreign ministers.
“Every decision taken by the Arab League rejects an intervention,” he added, days after the pan-Arabic body imposed its own unprecedented sanctions against President Bashar al-Assad’s regime. Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem accused “some League members” this week of “pushing to internationalise the conflict.”
Meanhile, the brother of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, several ministers and telecom magnate Rami Makhluf are on a list of 17 senior figures to be targeted by Arab League sanctions, officials said Thursday.
Under the economic measures agreed this week by the 22-member organisation, they would be banned from travelling in the region and have any assets in Arab countries frozen, if the list is confirmed at a meeting on Saturday. Ministers from Qatar, Egypt, Algeria, Oman and Sudan are to meet in Doha on Saturday. Other countries have been invited, but Iraq has already said it will boycott the Arab League measures.
