...Parkinson's Law on an international scale...
the lead role in trying to end nearly 10 months of bloodshed.
The ministerial committee on Syria met in Cairo, where the Arab League
...an organization of Arabic-speaking states with 22 member countries and four observers. The League tries to achieve Arab consensus on issues, which usually leaves them doing nothing but a bit of grimacing and mustache cursing...
has its headquarters, to be briefed by the head of the mission, General Mohammed Ahmed Mustafa al-Dabi.
The meeting, chaired by Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani, will discuss the monitors' first report which will contain "pictures, maps and information of the events witnessed by the monitors on the ground,"League Assistant Secretary General Ahmed Ben Hilli said.
According to an Arab League source, the report says that the monitors were "subjected to harassment by the Syrian government and by the opposition." It also recommends that the mission continue its work and that monitors be equipped with more technological assistance, the source told news hounds.
A team of Arab League monitors has been in Syria since December 26, trying to assess whether
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneckal-Assad
Supressor of the Damascenes...
's regime is complying with a peace accord aimed at ending its deadly crackdown on dissent.
Critics say it has been completely outmanoeuvred by the government and has failed to make any progress towards stemming the crackdown. They have called for the mission to pull out.
Dabi, a Sudanese former military intelligence chief who is himself the focus of controversy, said it was too early to judge the mission.
"This is the first time that the vaporous Arab League has carried out such a mission," Dabi told Britannia's Observer newspaper. "But it has only just started, so I have not had enough time to form a view."
The Arab League has admitted to "mistakes" but defended the mission, saying it had secured the release of prisoners and withdrawal of tanks from cities. It said rather than pull out, it planned to send more observers.
"No plan to withdraw the observers is on the agenda of the Arab ministerial committee meeting on Syria," the bloc's deputy secretary general, Adnan Issa, told AFP on Saturday.