As Turks, "I wish we had not crossed the sectarian rubicon in Syria!"

Via FLC

(Reuters) - Turkey, with strong backing from its Arab and Western allies, very much wants Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step down -- but not just yet.... across the region and in Western capitals there are fears that Assad's opponents are not ready to take power, and that Syria's ethnic and sectarian mosaic could disintegrate...
The main worry, Syria watchers say, is that what began nine months ago as a civic uprising is turning into a shooting war capable of spilling into a lethal sectarian conflict...This deadly cocktail could then be exported to Syria's fragile multi-confessional neighbours, particularly Lebanon and Iraq where Damascus has fanned and exploited sectarian divisions in the past -- and Turkey itself, where Ankara suspects Syria has already resumed support for Kurdish insurgents in the southeast....
Senior foreign ministry officials say they fear Syria could become a new front line in the regional contest between Saudi Arabia and Syria's last significant ally, Iran, or, put in sectarian terms, between Sunnis and Shi'ites of which the Alawites who form the backbone of the Assad establishment are an arcane offshoot...
Soli Ozel, a prominent commentator and academic, said: "All the skeletons of sectarian strife have come out of the closet. Once the regime falls I don't see how we avoid a major sectarian conflict if not a bloodbath."
He believes Turkey, which has its own unresolved ethnic divisions with its big Kurdish minority, will not remain untouched by this. "A country which has sectarian and ethnic faultlines of its own should be more circumspect about where it deploys its forces. I wish we had not crossed the sectarian rubicon in Syria," he said.

Posted by G, M, Z, or B at 2:36 PM

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