Keeping the UNSCR 2254 flag flying
Opposition unity in Geneva

There has been no shortage of opposition unification meetings in the course of the Syrian war. Over the weekend of 3–4 June, Geneva hosted yet another one. The gathering of the 37-member Syrian Negotiation Commission (SNC) general assembly was the first since 2019 in which all the body’s components and constituent “platforms” took part. It is happening now because of a growing realization among oppositionists of all stripes that should UNSCR 2254 be ignored by the Moscow or Amman tracks, they will have no further role to play in political talks. They are engaged in a last-ditch defence of the opposition’s right to shape Syria’s future. 

The SNC’s president, Dr Badr Jamous, has made it his mission to reinvigorate the SNC. In the process, he has had to confront one of the opposition’s perennial problems: challenges to internal cohesion caused by diverging local and regional agendas. The Moscow platform, for instance, has long called for the UN’s Constitutional Committee meetings to be held in Damascus instead of Geneva. The National Coordination Body, a gathering of mostly Damascus-based leftist and Arab nationalist parties, has tended to view Arab normalisation with Assad as an opportunity rather than a threat. The Cairo platform, meanwhile, has floated the idea of giving representation in the SNC to the Syrian Democratic Council, which is dominated by the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD). These positions starkly contrast with that of the “mainstream” opposition, held notably by the Syrian Opposition Coalition (generally known as the “Etilaf”), which holds the SNC presidency and that has to meet the expectations of the “revolutionary street” while keeping domestic and regional allies on board. 

The SNC general assembly’s concluding statement was thus a feat of trapeze artistry. It “took note” of diplomatic efforts in Amman and Moscow without passing any clear judgements on them. In a nod to the civil society conference in Paris it urged “formulating a healthy relationship between political and civil society.” It also called for concerted efforts to secure the “safe and voluntary return” of refugees and for an equitable distribution of aid and development assistance – a first foray for the SNC into this area. The SNC hopes that such an open-minded and “mature” approach to politics will keep options open for exploiting any diplomatic breakthrough, whether at the level of the currently dormant UN Geneva process or the Amman and Moscow tracks that are proceeding independently of the UN. 

As things now stand, the UN Office of the Special Envoy (OSE) and the SNC find themselves in the same life raft. Both feel adrift from the main currents of diplomatic activity, and both feel that something needs to be done. Whether they can find a way to reinforce each other around the goal of preserving UNSCR 2254 as a reference point for Syria diplomacy will depend in large part on whether the UN is ready to respect a key tenant of the Resolution: the parity of the SNC and the Syrian regime as negotiating partners. Over the past years, the UN has treated the SNC as an after-thought – something it may come to regret if UNSCR 2254 fades from view, and with it the UN’s relevance.