Interviews with Radwan Ziadeh

All historians, they know that the Middle East region was only looking for the spark, because we have this before in Eastern Europe, in Latin America in the ’80s, in Eastern Europe in the ’90s, where everything started in Poland, then Czechoslovakia and ended in Romania, Bulgaria and all of that. This is what [Samuel] Huntington [an American political scientist most recognized for his “Clash of Civilizations” thesis] called the third wave of democratization. And the fourth wave of democratization, the color revolutions in Ukraine, in Lebanon, in Georgia.

It was a matter of time before that arrived to the Middle East, because you have very educated middle class. And you have a very educated young generation who are open to the social media, who are open to the new revolution in technology. And of course they – when they compare what’s happened – what’s going on in other countries and what they are going in their own countries, a lot of disappointment and frustration. Then it was a matter of time and the way when the spark would start and when the revolution will erupt.

This is why it was started in Tunisia, where Mohamed Bouazizi [a Tunisian fruit vendor who was extorted and beaten by the government] set himself on fire. And no one expected that’s what will happen in Tunisia will ended up with the most aggressive dictatorship regimes: in Egypt, in Yemen, in Libya and of course in Syria. The struggle started, but it was much more difficult in the whole Arab region than in other regions, in Latin America or in Eastern Europe, because the nature of the authoritarian regimes in the Middle East – more aggressive and more authoritarians. We see that the number of casualties killed in Libya, in Yemen, and now of course the tragedy of what’s going on in Syria. First, politics about dignity, the way the security forces and Mukhabarat [Syrian intelligence agency] – they dealing with the citizens, with the people.

Second, of course there are economic reasons where you have an economic crisis hitting the whole region with the most important thing, the higher percentage of the unemployment. You have in each Arabic country it’s different from other, but there is no less than 15 percent. Then you have of course, the demographic growth of all of these Arabic countries. They are very young societies. In Syria, as example, you have from 25 to 30 – you have 58 percent of the Syrian population less than 30 years old. And that’s the same in Egypt, in Tunisia, in all of that. All of these factors and conditions help in the Arab Spring to start it. And in Tunisia was much easier because of the role of the army, the National Army, where you have very professional army who refuse to open or shoot on citizens and stay away from politics and allowed for all the political parties to start the democratic process. In Egypt, the army was professional.

He refused to open the fire on their citizens. But then he thought that he can play a role in the transition. The SCAF [Supreme Council of the Armed Forces – Egypt’s military leadership] made a lot of mistakes in the transition process. In Syria and in Libya, it was much worse, where you have a very strong army, but it’s not professional. It’s a family army. The army is made not to protect the people rather than to defend the Assad family. That’s what happened. Where the army itself is corrupt, most of the officers and soldiers refuse to open the fire. And they join what’s called the Free Syrian Army [an armed opposition group in Syria established in 2011 to oppose Syrian President Bashar Assad]. And others who are still loyal to the Assad regime still fighting with the Assad regime.

And we don’t know when that will end if there is no international support where the Syrian people, they are bleeding for international support, for the United States to take actions, to implement the no-fly zone and the safety zone. But unfortunately, the United States did not take any actions and allowing this struggle to go on and drag on, which left, as I said, more than 35,000 being killed, more than 2 and a half million displaced inside Syria internally and more than half million as Syrian refugees in neighboring countries.

Radwan Ziadeh is a Syrian dissident and democracy activist. He grew up in a middle class family in Damascus and became politically active after the death of President Hafez Assad in 2000. Remembering the struggles of his own family growing up, Ziadeh wanted to live in a free country and helped establish the Syrian Human Rights Association, a group dedicated to promoting human rights, in 2001.

Four years later, Ziadeh founded his own organization called the Damascus Center for Human Rights Studies. Through his center, Ziadeh acted as an international lobbyist for the cause of Syrian freedom. Speaking at venues like the United Nations Human Rights Council, Ziadeh raised awareness about the human rights abuses being committed by the Assad regime in Damascus. As Ziadeh intensified the spotlight on Syria, the government retaliated by placing a travel ban on his family, effectively imprisoning them in Syria, or stranding those traveling abroad in third countries. In 2007, Ziadeh fled Syria for the United States as the Assad government issued a warrant for his arrest.

Beginning in March 2011, the Syrian people revolted against President Bashar Assad, who had succeeded his father, challenging the government’s control over the country and resulting in a tense standoff between the remnants of the regime and diverse opposition forces. In 2012, Ziadeh seized the opportunity afforded him by the revolution and visited his homeland for the first time in five years. He continues to reside in the United States where he works through organizations like the Damascus Center for Human Rights Studies and the Syrian Center for Political and Strategic Studies to rebuild Syria into a free and democratic society.

Twitter: @radwanziadeh