International
Dusan Vranic/AP
Bashar al-Assad won 88.7 percent of the vote in Syria's presidential election, parliament speaker Mohammad al-Laham said on Wednesday, securing a third seven-year term in office despite civil war that grew out of protests against his rule.
"I declare the victory of Dr. Bashar Hafez al-Assad as president of the Syrian Arab Republic with an absolute majority of the votes cast in the election," Laham said in a televised address from his office at parliament.
The two other candidates, Hassan al-Nouri and Maher Hajjar, won 4.3 percent and 3.2 percent of votes, respectively.
The head of Syria’s Supreme Constitutional Court said Wednesday that 73.42 percent of all eligible Syrians participated in the presidential election.
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"I declare the victory of Dr Bashar Hafez al-Assad as president of the Syrian Arab Republic with an absolute majority of the votes cast in the election," Laham said in a televised address from his office in the Syrian parliament. The opposition and its international backers have denounced the election as a farce, saying the two relatively unknown and state-approved challengers offered no real alternative to Assad. Voting was held only in government-controlled areas, excluding vast chunks of northern and eastern Syria that are in rebel hands. 'Committed allies' Fawas Gerges, a Middle East expert based in London, called the election win a "culmination of Assad's accumulated victories" since his opponents took up weapons against his regime in 2011. "The opposition does not seem to be able to genuinely change the balance of power on the ground," he told Al Jazeera. "The opposition's allies - the US and others - have not been as solid and committed as Assad's allies. Assad's allies - Iran, Russia, Hezbollah - have fought tooth and nail to keep Assad in place." RELATED: Huge turnout for Syrian vote in Lebanon For the first time in decades, there were multiple candidates on the ballot. In previous presidential elections, Assad and before him his father, Hafez, were elected in single candidate referendums in which voters cast yes-no ballots. Minutes after results were announced, people took to the streets in Damascus to celebrate. State television also showed crowds cheering and dancing in Qamishli in the Kurdish northeast of the country, the Druze city of Suweida in the south and the contested city of Aleppo in the north.
Celebratory shots fired by Assad supporters killed at least three people in the capital and wounded dozens more, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. 'Great big zero' Earlier on Wednesday, the US Secretary of State John Kerry said during a visit to neighbouring Lebanon that the elections were "a great big zero." "They are meaningless, and they are meaningless because you can't have an election where millions of your people don't even have the ability to vote, where they don't have the ability to contest the election, and they have no choice," Kerry told reporters in Beirut . The European Union urged Assad to re-engage in talks, condemning the vote as illegitimate. "These elections are illegitimate and undermine the political efforts to find a solution to this horrific conflict," it said in a statement. Meanwhile, an international delegation led by allies of Assad praised the elections saying they were democratic and transparent. |
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Source:
Al Jazeera and agencies
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"I declare the victory of Dr Bashar Hafez al-Assad as president of the Syrian Arab Republic with an absolute majority of the votes cast in the election," Laham said in a televised address from his office in the Syrian parliament. The opposition and its international backers have denounced the election as a farce, saying the two relatively unknown and state-approved challengers offered no real alternative to Assad. Voting was held only in government-controlled areas, excluding vast chunks of northern and eastern Syria that are in rebel hands. 'Committed allies' Fawas Gerges, a Middle East expert based in London, called the election win a "culmination of Assad's accumulated victories" since his opponents took up weapons against his regime in 2011. "The opposition does not seem to be able to genuinely change the balance of power on the ground," he told Al Jazeera. "The opposition's allies - the US and others - have not been as solid and committed as Assad's allies. Assad's allies - Iran, Russia, Hezbollah - have fought tooth and nail to keep Assad in place." RELATED: Huge turnout for Syrian vote in Lebanon For the first time in decades, there were multiple candidates on the ballot. In previous presidential elections, Assad and before him his father, Hafez, were elected in single candidate referendums in which voters cast yes-no ballots. Minutes after results were announced, people took to the streets in Damascus to celebrate. State television also showed crowds cheering and dancing in Qamishli in the Kurdish northeast of the country, the Druze city of Suweida in the south and the contested city of Aleppo in the north.
Celebratory shots fired by Assad supporters killed at least three people in the capital and wounded dozens more, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. 'Great big zero' Earlier on Wednesday, the US Secretary of State John Kerry said during a visit to neighbouring Lebanon that the elections were "a great big zero." "They are meaningless, and they are meaningless because you can't have an election where millions of your people don't even have the ability to vote, where they don't have the ability to contest the election, and they have no choice," Kerry told reporters in Beirut . The European Union urged Assad to re-engage in talks, condemning the vote as illegitimate. "These elections are illegitimate and undermine the political efforts to find a solution to this horrific conflict," it said in a statement. Meanwhile, an international delegation led by allies of Assad praised the elections saying they were democratic and transparent. |
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Source:
Al Jazeera and agencies
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Content on this website is for general information purposes only. Your comments are provided by your own free will and you take sole responsibility for any direct or indirect liability. You hereby provide us with an irrevocable, unlimited, and global license for no consideration to use, reuse, delete or publish comments, in accordance with Community Rules & Guidelines and Terms and Conditions.
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On World Environment Day, conservation efforts in Nagaland state hailed as a model for protecting nature.
|
|
Using cutting-edge exoskeleton technology, a paralysed Brazilian will kick off the World Cup opening ceremony.
|
|
Migrants from India are trying to return home as job opportunities dry up and government regulations get tougher.
|
|
The crown prince may lack his father's charisma, but perhaps a more 'professional' king is what the country needs now.
|
|
Compared to Tiananmen protesters, China's young today are more concerned with economic growth than political reforms.
|
Assad's foes have dismissed the election as a charade, saying the two relatively unknown challengers offered no real alternative and that no poll held in the midst of civil war could be considered credible.
Abdul Halim Khaddam, the vice president under Assad's late father, President Hafez al-Assad, said the votes are "as meaningless as piles of paper."
"Those who choose Bashar al-Assad or anyone else will be either forced to do so or they will be acting out of fear. This is not a [real] election, and everyone knows that," Khaddam told Asharq al-Awsat, a pan-Arab, London-based newspaper, on Wednesday. He added that Assad conducted the elections to defy the international community.
Syrian officials had described the predicted victory as vindication of Assad's three-year campaign against those fighting to oust him.
Voting took place in government-controlled areas of Syria, but not in large parts of northern and eastern Syria held by rebels fighting to end 44 years of Assad family rule.
The U.N.–Arab League envoy, Lakhdar Brahimi, resigned last month, partly out of frustration over Assad’s decision to hold elections, according to diplomats. The vote was widely seen as a bid by Assad to defy widespread opposition and extend his grip on power.
The conflict has killed an estimated 160,000 people, driven nearly 3 million abroad as refugees and displaced many more inside Syria.
Al Jazeera and wire services
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Content on this website is for general information purposes only. Your comments are provided by your own free will and you take sole responsibility for any direct or indirect liability. You hereby provide us with an irrevocable, unlimited, and global license for no consideration to use, reuse, delete or publish comments, in accordance with Community Rules & Guidelines and Terms and Conditions.