Stop meddling in Syria: Grand Mufti to Turkey

Syrian Grand Mufti Sheikh Ahmad Badreddin Hassoun has criticized Turkey’s meddling in the domestic affairs of Syria.

There is evidence that Turkey is both arming and financing the armed groups in Syria. Turkey has also opened its borders to criminals and thieves to infiltrate into Syrian territory, Sheikh Hassoun said in an interview with Almayadeen Arabic news channel on Friday.

He also called on Syrian government to take legal action against Turkish Prime Minister Raccip Tayipp Erdogan through the United Nations and the International Criminal Police Organization, known as Interpol.

He added that Syria is paying the price for its support of the resistance and the Palestinian cause.

On Friday, the Syrian government sent a letter to the UN, blasting Turkey’s “destructive” role in the conflict that has ravaged the country for the past 23 months.

In the letter, the Syrian Foreign Ministry accused Ankara of publicly supporting and financing terrorists fighting against the Syrian government and allowing its soil to be used for training and housing anti-Damascus terrorist groups.

“Turkey has turned its territory into camps used to house, train, finance and infiltrate armed terrorist groups, among them the al-Qaeda network and the al-Nusra Front,” said the letter.

It also accused Turkey of taking “increasingly hostile stances towards Syria, by blocking measures taken by Damascus for a political solution to end the unrest.”

Analysts believe the move by Turkey is part of an anti-Syria plot hatched by the US, Qatar and Saudi Arabia to fuel the unrest in the country by increasing the number of militants fighting against the government.

Syria has been experiencing unrest since mid-March 2011. Many people, including large numbers of security personnel, have been killed in the violence.

The Syrian government says the chaos is being orchestrated from outside the country, and there are reports that a very large number of the militants are foreign nationals.