London mayor: use Iran help on Syria

London mayor Boris Johnson has dismissed plans of weapons deliveries to Syrian militants, calling for a multi-sided conference, involving Iran, to end the bloodshed.

Johnson, who was commenting after British Prime Minister David Cameron said sending arms to Syrian militants is vital, wrote in an article for the Daily Telegraph on Monday that such a move is “pressing weapons into the hands of maniacs”, stressing everyone should end the “madness” in Syria.

“This is the moment for a total ceasefire, an end to the madness,” Johnson wrote.

“It is time for the US, Russia, the EU, Turkey, Iran, Saudi and all the players to convene an intergovernmental conference to try to halt the carnage. We can’t use Syria as an arena for geopolitical point-scoring or muscle-flexing, and we won’t get a ceasefire by pressing weapons into the hands of maniacs,” he added.

His comments come after Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that western governments should not provide weapons to foreign-backed militants, who have been committing war crimes and crimes against humanity.

“It is barely worth it (supplying arms) to support people who not only kill their enemies but open up their bodies and eat their internal organs in front of the public and the cameras,” Putin said, before almost clashing with Cameron at a Sunday press conference on Syria.

Back on May 12, a gruesome footage emerged on the internet showing a foreign-backed Syrian militant, later identified by Human Rights Watch as head of Farouq Brigade Abu Sakkar, cutting out the internal organs of a dead Syrian soldier and biting into it.

Farouq Brigade is one of the key groups that will receive the western arms deliveries through the foreign-backed Free Syrian Army.

The ghastly scene has not been the only proud show of savagery by the militants, going viral on the internet.

A picture posted online back in May showed a foreign-backed militant holding the severed head of a pro-Assad man over a barbecue as if to cook it while a footage showed a teenage militant hacking off the head of an apparent civilian captive in front of the camera.

The London mayor also warned the British government that it would be “impossible” to arm the foreign-backed militants and expect they do not end up in the hands of “al-Qaeda-affiliated thugs”.

Cameron’s move is also challenged by his Liberal Democrat coalition partner Nick Clegg, who has warned that it is not “the right thing to do” now.