Speaking to local dignitaries in the Syrian capital, Damascus, President Bashar al-Assad said on Sunday that the West still deals with terrorism in a hypocritical way.
In his first public address in a year, Assad said: “[The West] calls it terrorism when it hits them, and revolution, freedom, democracy and human rights when it hits us” adding that “how could those who spread the seeds of terrorism combat it”.
Changes from the West, he said, "cannot be counted on as long as they follow the double-standards policy … We have not depended but on ourselves since the first day, hoping for good intentions from the real friends of the Syrian people”.
Assad said: “Russia has constituted, along with China, a safety valve that prevented the transformation of the Security Council into a tool for threatening peoples and a platform for aggression on states, particularly Syria”.
“Our approach has always been the response to all initiatives that we receive regardless the intentions because the Syrian blood is above all else and halting war is a priority”, the president added.
The president said: "After years of war, the Syrian people have been resilient, sacrificing for the sake of the homeland, and if they had wanted to give up, they would not have waited all this time and paid as much as that".
“The blood of our faithful brothers from the Lebanese resistance has mixed with the blood of their brothers in the Army and they have their prominent role and effective performance along with the Army in making achievements”, he said.
Assad also distinguished between the "foreign-produced opposition, which gets orders from its masters abroad and the internal opposition that participates with us for overcoming the crisis and increasing the immunity of the homeland".
"Homeland is not for those who live in it or have its nationality and passport, but for those who defend and protect it", he said.
The president added, "In parallel with the military war, we were conducting a psychic-media war, which aimed at propagating and consolidating the idea that Syria is fragmented into entities distributed geographically among (government) supporters, oppositions and other sectarian and ethnic groups".
President Assad affirmed that Syria’s victory in its war will not only mean defeating terrorism, but will also restore stability to the region, as the future of the Middle East will be based on the future of Syria.
“Our choice has been clear since the first day…owning will and conviction of victory”, said Assad, adding "This homeland is ours and defending it is our duty”.
