The boss, Lee Smith, and 47 other foreign policy experts signed a letter to President Obama urging action on Syria. Specifically, they recommend “the following immediate actions to bring an end to Assad’s brutality”:
· Show leadership on sanctions by immediately supporting legislation originally proposed by Senators Kirsten Gillibrand, Mark Kirk, and Joseph Lieberman, and Representatives Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Eliot Engel, and working with allies to impose other crippling multilaterally-based sanctions on the Syrian government.
· Form a contact group of like-minded international partners to coordinate national strategies to further increase pressure on the Assad regime.
· Establish direct contact with various anti-regime Syrian groups, especially the Syrian National Council, as well as those who have defected from the Syrian military, and evaluate their leadership and membership with the aim of increasing the capabilities of those groups whose political goals accord with U.S. national security interests.
· Work with Turkey and other partners to establish safe havens in Syria, as well as no-go zones for the Assad regime’s security forces to protect civilians.
· Form a contact group of like-minded international partners to coordinate national strategies to further increase pressure on the Assad regime.
· Establish direct contact with various anti-regime Syrian groups, especially the Syrian National Council, as well as those who have defected from the Syrian military, and evaluate their leadership and membership with the aim of increasing the capabilities of those groups whose political goals accord with U.S. national security interests.
· Work with Turkey and other partners to establish safe havens in Syria, as well as no-go zones for the Assad regime’s security forces to protect civilians.
Whole letter here:
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