Geir Pedersen, the United Nations Special Envoy for Syria, has issued a stark warning to the Syrian leadership, cautioning that the country is standing “on the brink of the abyss” and risks descending into a situation similar to that of Libya unless promised political changes are implemented. The warning was delivered during an interview with The Financial Times, a British newspaper.
In a related assessment, Kelly Campa, Vice President of the Middle East team at the Institute for the Study of War in Washington, cautioned that the “lack of trust and shared political ground between the Al-Sharaa government and the rest of the Syrian society” poses a profound challenge to the new administration.
This UN alert comes at a critical juncture as the organisation attempts to revitalise the Syrian political process with a new post-Assad roadmap, amid increased regional pressure and deepening internal divisions.
Pedersen elaborated to the British daily that Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa “requires what I describe as a course correction,” stressing that the Syrian leadership must convince its citizens that the current phase represents a “new beginning after the dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad,” and is not simply “a new authoritarian regime in different clothing.”
The UN envoy also cautioned that the exclusion of minorities from the electoral process and the widespread erosion of societal trust threaten to ignite a fresh wave of sectarian violence, especially given the sluggish pace of reforms.
The Financial Times draws a comparison to the Libyan crisis, recalling that the 2011 revolution, backed by the US, UK, and France, quickly led to the downfall of Muammar Gaddafi’s regime but left the country divided since 2014 between two competing administrations in the east and the west. Despite this parallel, Nannar Hawach, a Syrian expert at the International Crisis Group, told Deutsche Welle that “the Syrian state has not completely collapsed as happened in Libya,” pointing out that Syria, although fractured into spheres of influence, still operates under the umbrella of “a single central government.” Hawach added that regional and international powers—including Jordan, Turkey, Iraq, the Gulf States, and the US- are keen to avoid Syria becoming a “failed state” due to the serious security repercussions this would have on the wider region.
