Fabius: France Helped Syrian Military Figures to Desert
France has helped a number of Syrian military figures to desert from President Bashar Assad's embattled regime, Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said Tuesday.
"We have contributed to a certain number of desertion operations," he told a parliamentary commission, without giving any further details.
The comment came a day after defected general Manaf Tlass said French secret agents helped him escape in July from Syria, where he had been a member of Assad's inner circle.
A general in the elite Republican Guard charged with protecting the regime, Tlass is the son of former defense minister Mustafa Tlass, a close friend of Assad's late father and predecessor, Hafez Assad.
France is among the Western nations leading calls for Assad to step down in a bid to end the bloody conflict in Syria that erupted in March last year.
French President Francois Hollande has said that if the Syrian opposition forms a "provisional, inclusive and representative" government, his own government will formally recognize it.
Source: Agence France Presse
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