Failure to take hold

Not long after the UN Security Council adopted a resolution calling for a ceasefire "without delay" in Syria for thirty days, warring sides in the Syrian conflict began to claim exceptions for their role in the fighting as not covered by the truce.

Turkey now says that its military intervention in and around Afrin is not covered by the resolution and it will, therefore, continue war against the Syrian Kurds in north of Syria. Damascus also says that the resolution is not binding on its continued fighting against "terrorists", without defining who the terrorists are. Iran, likewise, made similar claims about its involvement in the war as not falling within the scope of the resolution.

No doubt that Al Nusra and Al Qaeda militants may think the same and feel free to continue war against their enemies. Russia, too, may think that its aerial bombardment of "terrorists" falls outside the parameters of the resolution.

At this rate, the resolution, on which much hope had been pinned to halt the slaughter of innocent people, has been rendered without much meaning or effect.

This problem on the applicability or non-applicability of the resolution on all parties to the conflict may have arisen because of the wording of the resolution. To be sure, many words used in the operative paragraphs of the resolution were made imprecise enough on purpose to appease conflicting demands. Drafting the resolution was, therefore, not exactly all plain sailing as various members of the council bargained.

No wonder the international community now has a resolution that some parties involved in the fighting claim as non-binding to them.