United Nations has a project codenamed “Syria – The Day After”

http://www.phantomreport.com/united-nations-has-a-project-codenamed-syria-the-day-after



United Nations has a project codenamed “Syria – The Day After”


by Phantom Report on April 1, 2013



Source: Al Jazeera

Here is what the main stakeholders in Syria are planning in the event of a major change in the conflict:

United Nations

UN planners have been looking at a range of options. They fear that
if Assad is eventually defeated, there could be widespread retribution
against his minority Alawite sect, and the swift deployment of human
rights observers and UN monitors is one possibility.

The United Nations has a project codenamed “Syria – The Day After”.
Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon has put his deputy, Jan Elliason, in
charge of the response. After wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the US and
its North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) allies have no appetite to
get directly involved in the reconstruction of Syria, meaning that by
default, the UN will probably have to take the lead.



[...]

Western Powers

Despite growing calls on Capitol Hill for some US involvement, the
Obama administration has shown no inclination towards intervention.

France and the UK are toying with the idea of sending arms to the
opposition, but are currently prevented from doing so by European Union
rules.

Military planners are left with the unenviable task of
“second-guessing” their political masters. They know that when there
is eventually an abrupt shift on the ground in Syria, events could
suddenly move extremely fast, in which case they will need to have
plans.

Securing Assad’s arsenal of chemical weapons is seen as the top
priority for Western powers. They fear these weapons could be used in a
“last stand” by the Assad regime, or captured by armed groups. The
Lebanese Shia group Hezbollah is widely thought to have operatives in
Syria. A number of opposition groups, particularly those that fight
under the banner of Jabhat al-Nusra, share the ideology of al-Qaeda.

It is also feared that some within Assad’s military or the opposition
may be ready to sell chemical munitions to the highest bidder.

In recent weeks, some US units have been involved in chemical warfare
training. But Western military sources believe Assad’s chemical arsenal
is dispersed across numerous sites in Syria. Recovering them all would
require a major military operation, involving hundreds of troops. One
official told me: “The danger is that this would look like a full-scale
invasion.”

The US and its allies are deeply concerned about the crisis
spreading. The growing humanitarian crisis could overwhelm Syria and
Jordan. Last month, the number of refugees – both those registered and
those awaiting registration – topped one million. As of April 1, the
figure stood at more than 1.2 million.

The refugee crisis has caused worries about the stability of Syria
and neighbouring countries whose borders were carved out of the Ottoman
Empire at the end of World War I. Some fear Syria could eventually split
into a number of different fiefdoms, creating the possibility that the
borders of surrounding countries may also be redrawn.

NATO has categorically repeated over the past two years that it has
no plans to intervene in Syria. However, if any of its major member
nations decided to intervene, NATO may be pressured to rubber-stamp the
operation.
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