Qatar Emir Meets Muallem, Says 'Keen on Syria Stability'

Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem on Monday held talks with Emir of Qatar Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani on “the current situation in the Arab arena and the situation in Syria,” Syrian official news agency SANA reported.

Muallem and a Syrian delegation on Sunday held talks in Doha with an Arab League ministerial team on ways to end the unrest in revolt-hit Syria.

Arab League chief Nabil al-Arabi said the organization's foreign ministers were awaiting a response after putting a roadmap to end the unrest to the Syrian delegation led by Muallem.

The roadmap calls for tanks to be withdrawn from Syrian streets and for talks between the embattled regime of President Bashar al-Assad and its opponents, Arabi told Agence France Presse in the Qatari capital.

During his talks with Muallem, “Sheikh Hamad expressed keenness to preserve security and stability in Syria, affirming the need to develop relations between the two countries,” SANA said.

The meeting was attended by Qatar’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani and deputy PM Abdullah bin Hamad al-Atiya. Attending on the Syrian side were Assad’s Political and Media Advisor Buthaina Shaaban, Deputy FM Faisal Muqdad and Syria's permanent envoy to the Arab League Youssef Ahmed.

The talks come amid growing fears among regional leaders that unchecked Syrian bloodshed could further inflame the Arab world.

"The Arab proposal to Syria calls for withdrawing tanks and all military vehicles to bring an immediate end to the violence and give assurances to the Syrian street," said Arabi.

The peace plan also calls for dialogue to take place in Cairo between Syrian regime officials and opposition figures, he added, before leaving Doha without indicating if a response had been received from Assad.

The Syrian delegation also left Doha later without making any statements, Qatar-based Al-Jazeera news channel reported, following Muallem’s talks with the Qatari emir.

The region is reeling from unprecedented uprisings that have since January unseated three long-time rulers in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya.

Repeating previous warnings, Qatari PM Sheikh Hamad said Assad risked forcing an international intervention if he allows the violence to continue.

"The entire region is at risk of a massive storm," Sheikh Hamad told reporters after Sunday's three-hour meeting.

Assad must take "concrete steps," he said, to end the unrest that according to the United Nations has claimed more than 3,000 Syrian lives since March.

Sunday's Arab ministerial meeting "agreed on a serious proposal to stop the killing and all forms of violence in Syria," said Sheikh Hamad.

A follow-up meeting will be held Wednesday in Cairo, "whether or not there is an agreement," he added.

Assad warned in a newspaper interview that any Western intervention in Syria would cause an "earthquake" across the Middle East.

"Any problem in Syria will burn the whole region. If the plan is to divide Syria, that is to divide the whole region," Syria's embattled president told Britain's Sunday Telegraph.

The Daily Telegraph quoted Assad Monday dismissing the Syrian opposition as unrepresentative elements who did not deserve his time.

"I wouldn't waste my time talking about them," he said. "I don't know them. It's better to investigate whether they really represent Syrians."

The Doha talks came as Syrian activists put mounting pressure on the Arab League to suspend Syria's membership of the 22-member bloc and organized protests across Syria on Sunday calling for the League to "freeze the membership" of Syria and as the death toll in Syria rose.

On Monday, three people, including a 29-year-old man were shot dead by a sniper in the protest hub city of Homs, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Another civilian and an army deserter were killed in Hama province in a pursuit by security forces, the London-based group said in a statement.

A fourth civilian was shot dead in Harasta, a town near Damascus as security forces carried out raids and made at least 13 arrests, it added, a day after at least seven people were killed in violence in several cities.

Meanwhile, dozens of students demonstrated at the University of Qalamoun in the Damascus region demanding the fall of the Baath party regime.

"Bashar go away, there shall not be a dialogue," they chanted according to a video posted on You Tube website.

Almost 100 people were killed in Syria on Friday and Saturday, the two bloodiest days yet of the uprising, among them 30 Syrian security agents and dozens of civilians, according to Observatory.

In Damascus meanwhile, a national committee began work Monday "to draft a new constitution for Syria," the official SANA news agency reported.

A new constitution was one of the key demands of the Syrian opposition at the start of the anti-government protests in March. Now they are demanding Assad's ouster.