Foreign Affairs Committee on Feb. 12th, 2014

[Heba Sawan]

Actually, we have a lot of difficulty communicating inside Syria, especially in the besieged area and in the revolutionary cities. As you said, electricity and communications, including the Internet, were cut off. We had a lot of difficulty finding oil and petrol to turn on the generators. We also used to have a lot of chargers in every house, so we tried to turn on the generators and tried to charge those chargers and batteries to help us continue our communication work for maybe two days.

[Ameenah Sawan]

The problem inside Syria is that many areas don't have satellite Internet. Sometimes the regime has cut off the Internet for the cities. It is trying to kill them silently. This is really a big problem. Sometimes we can't find out what's going on there.

[Heba Sawan]

We want communications, machines, and all that, but first you have to open the scene to allow those machines to enter these towns. We didn't die from hunger because we didn't have food; we have food outside the city, but we weren't allowed to get it in. That's also for the communications, the machines, and all that stuff.

[Ameenah Sawan]

We did a lot of communication things during the last three years, and the whole world has the main idea about what's going on in Syria, so that is not a problem.

[David Anderson, Conservative, Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK]

What groups do you find most trustworthy, do you feel to be most helpful to you in your country?

Maybe my time is up.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Paul Dewar]

We're going to come back to that question in a minute perhaps.

We're now going to turn it over to Mr. Garneau, who's the spokesperson for one of the opposition parties, the Liberal Party.

Mr. Garneau.

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Westmount—Ville-Marie, QC]

Thank you to both of you for speaking to us. Your testimony is very powerful.

We're trying to learn more about what is going on in Syria. We realize there are many different factions that are involved in the conflict in your country. I'd like to begin by asking you about the organization you represent, the National Coalition of Syrian Revolution and Opposition Forces. Could you tell us what the primary objective, as you see it, of your organization, of the coalition, is?

[Heba Sawan]

Actually, we are not representatives of the coalition. Maybe....

[Jason Hunt, Officer, Government Affairs, National Coalition of Syrian Revolution and Opposition Forces]

I was just going to clarify for you, sir, that the coalition has helped fund their trip here and helped arrange some of these meetings, but they are not members of the coalition. They are speaking as citizens—

[Heba Sawan]

—and field activists.

[Jason Hunt]

—as field activists and as representatives of their local community.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Paul Dewar]

Sir, could you just identify yourself.

[Jason Hunt]

I'm sorry. I failed to do that at the beginning. My name is Jason Hunt. I'm the government affairs officer for the National Coalition of Syrian Revolution and Opposition Forces in our representative office to the United States. I'm just helping with logistics. It's their testimony.

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Westmount—Ville-Marie, QC]

Thank you very much for that clarification. Is it fair to ask you any questions about the coalition, or are you not familiar with that organization?

[Heba Sawan]

I'm sorry, we don't have that much information because we just left Syria three months ago. We were concentrating on our work on the ground.

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Westmount—Ville-Marie, QC]

All right, I'll try to redirect my questions.

There are many organizations and factions that are fighting in Syria and we see from the Geneva II talks that there is not necessarily a unity among the different forces. Do you have a sense of how much of the conflict in Syria is between different factions as opposed to being between the opposition forces and the Assad regime?

[Heba Sawan]

I don't think there's a division between the opposition forces. They are maybe not as united as we are longing for, but that doesn't give an excuse for what's going on in Syria for the world. They are all the time claiming that the opposition is not united enough and they are not working well, but that's not an excuse.

As you said, sir, in your Parliament, you have also different parties and this is also the Syrian opposition.

[Ameenah Sawan]

Everywhere we have different parties and different thinking, but our goal is the same. It's one goal.

[Heba Sawan]

Maybe on the ground the Syrian revolutionary people are fighting many groups, but all of them are against the regime. They are fighting the regime itself, and they are fighting the Iranian revolutionary guard and Hezbollah party, which are both classified by the international world as terrorists. Also, there's ISIS, the Islamic state in Iraq and al-Sham, which is the second face of the same coin of the regime. The Free Syrian Army in the north of Syria is fighting ISIS because of their terrorist activities and also because it is proven that the regime is buying their petrol and oil from ISIS. That proves they are just two faces of the same coin. The Free Syrian Army and moderate [Indaudible—Editor] are fighting terrorists and fighting many groups involved in terrorism.

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Westmount—Ville-Marie, QC]

Yes, one of the perceptions we have, reading the media information coming out of Syria, is that there are, how could I put this, more radical groups such as al-Nusra that are not necessarily working side-by-side with the Free Syrian Army to overthrow the Assad regime. In some cases there have even been suggestions that they have fought with each other. What is your perception of that?

[Heba Sawan]

Actually, those groups wouldn't be able to get into Syria without the regime first allowing it. The international world didn't support the Free Syrian Army from the beginning. When the international world supports the Free Syrian Army, that would weaken and reduce the power of al-Qaeda and al-Nusra automatically.

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Westmount—Ville-Marie, QC]

I have one last question. We hear there are millions of Syrians who have been displaced not only outside the country and have ended up in places like Turkey, Iraq, Egypt, Lebanon, and Jordan, but also many have moved internally.

Can you speak a little bit about those who have had to leave their homes and move to other places? Are there any quiet places in Syria, or is it a dangerous place everywhere?

[Heba Sawan]

There is no quiet place in Syria, except for some of the areas that are under the control of the regime with people who were pro-regime from the beginning. It's just the difference between how dangerous the areas are. A very dangerous area was besieged and there is shelling every day. There are hot areas and warm areas. There is no safety anywhere in Syria right now.

[Ameenah Sawan]

Even the people who are not under siege are really stuck in their area. They can't move to other places because of the checkpoints. Many people, maybe hundreds or thousands, are mostly civilians, and were killed at checkpoints by field executions. This is also another problem.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Paul Dewar]

We're going to go now to Ms. Brown, who is the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of International Development.