Australia softens stance on Syrian President Assad

The destruction and violence that have been associated with present Syria has impelled Australia to take a softer stance on the Assad regime. Foreign Minister Julie Bishop, who is currently at the United Nations meeting in New York, pointed out the need to find a political solution to the deadly war raging in the country and rendering its people homeless.

"The fear that a number of countries have is that if the Assad regime were either removed or collapsed, it would create a vacuum, and one might find that it was filled by an even more diabolical presence than the Assad regime," the ABC quoted Bishop as saying. "I don't for a moment shy away from the comments that we have made in the past about the illegitimacy of the regime."

Bishop said the kind of torture President Bashar Al-Assad unleashed on his own people is appalling and unthinkable, but cautioned that the crisis in Syria has taken a new turn. The humanitarian crisis faced by Europe and the Middle East is something the world has never seen before, and a political solution is more necessary at the moment than military action.

She noted that the involvement of Russian military in the Syrian crisis underlines the urgency for a political solution to the problem. "The reality is president Assad is still in Syria, the reality is Russia is backing President Assad," Ms Bishop said.

This is a matter that Bishop said she was discussing with her U.S counterparts for some time, and she believes all options to restore peace in Syria should be considered.

However, Opposition leader Bill Shorten said, "Labor has no time for the administration or the government of Assad, it has been a terrible government and it's done terrible things to its population."

He said that Australia should not be picking sides between the Islamic state and President Assad, since there isn’t much of a difference between the two.

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