Britain and its western allies should be prepared to enforce a no-fly zone inside Syria to protect refugees even if Russia vetoes a UN resolution, the co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on Syria has said.
Labour MP Jo Cox, working in conjunction with the former Conservative international development secretary Andrew Mitchell, is pressing the British government to develop a new comprehensive diplomatic political and military strategy focussed on protecting Syrian civilians against attacks both by Isis and Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad.
Her initiative is broadly supported by the shadow foreign secretary, Hilary Benn, so long as it is part of generating a broader discussion in the Labour party on its Syrian strategy. The Labour conference agreed to support safe zones so long as it has support from the UN under a chapter V11 resolution, and it is accepted that it would require military enforcement by air.
The British government has so far rejected no-fly zones in common with the Obama administration, but is testing the water with Labour MPs to see if it can create a clear consensus in the Commons for UK military action in Syria.
But the idea of no-fly or no-bombing zones has the support of the former US secretary of state Hillary Clinton and there have been reports that her successor, John Kerry, has again asked his officials to examine the proposals. Barack Obama last week rejected the proposal on the basis it would not be possible to guarantee that the zones remained safe. The increased presence of Russian fighter jets in Syria protecting Assad might also risk a war between western air forces and the Russians.
Speaking on BBC Daily Politics show on Monday, Cox said: “On the military side we need to get two things right if we only talk about limited air strikes against Isil [or Isis], and I back international action against Isil, it will be counter-productive. We have to look at the conflict dynamic in Syria and that is 75% of civilian deaths and causalities are caused by the Assad regime due to his aerial bombardment of civilians.”
She said solely attacking Islamic State will not help the refugees, or stop the extremism.
“This is not about escalating a conflict directly to take on Russia. This is about a deterrence effect to stop the Syrian regime targeting their own civilians. I think it would be enforceable from the Mediterranean using US French and UK military capability already out there it would mean the ariel bombardment of Syrian civilians would stop and it would create space for peace talks.”
The MP said accepted her position was slightly different to the Labour leader, Jeremy Corby, but held out the hope that the eventual Commons vote would be a free vote in which MPs could decide according to their conscience.
The Cox initiative is important since it indicates that David is unlikely to win the support of Labour MPs if he simply calls for the UK to join the existing bombing campaign against Isis. The prime minsiter may need as many as 50 Labour MPs to win a Commons vote owing to doubts among Tories.
It has been reported in America that US officials said a no-fly zone was one of many options being discussed among Obama’s national security advisers and with US coalition allies on the sidelines of the UN general assembly last week in New York.
While the idea was not rejected out of hand by the White House, administration officials emphasised that such a safe zone was not currently being seriously considered.
“What the secretary has been doing is looking for ways to increase pressure on Isil, ease the humanitarian burden, and increase leverage for diplomacy to end the conflict,” a senior administration official said. “In that context, this is one of many ideas that he and others discussed.”
Kerry’s predecessor, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, along with some 2016 Republican hopefuls have backed the idea of a no-fly zone. But Obama dismissed the idea when asked at a press conference, saying “When I hear people offering up half-baked ideas as if they are solutions, or trying to downplay the challenges involved in this situation – what I’d like to see people ask is, specifically, precisely, what exactly would you do, and how would you fund it, and how would you sustain it,” he said. “And typically, what you get is a bunch of mumbo jumbo.”
Turkey, France and the Syrian opposition have in the past pushed for a safe zone to protect civilians from Syrian airstrikes, but the Obama administration has repeatedly rejected the idea as too difficult to enforce.
