The UN's chief peacekeeper, Under-Secretary General for Peacekeeping Operations Herve Ladsous, was uncharacteristically blunt when asked on 12 June whether the conflict in Syria had developed into a civil war. "Yes, I think we can say that," he replied. "Clearly what is happening is that the government of Syria lost some large chunks of territory in several cities to the opposition and wants to retake control of these areas. Now we have confirmed reports of not only the use of tanks and artillery but also attack helicopters." Mr Ladsous also sounded doubtful about the value of the UN observers in Syrian, saying that "keeping a peacekeeping force when there is definitely no peace to observe – that summarizes the situation. An observer mission which cannot observe a ceasefire because there is no ceasefire."

Mr Ladsous also suggested that the future of the UN mission might depend on the progress made towards forming special envoy Kofi Annan's proposed 'contact group' – which would bring together Russia, China, the US, Britain, France and regional players in the conflict such as Saudi Arabia, Iran, Qatar and Turkey – in order, as Mr Annan's spokesman Ahmad Fawzi put it on 12 June, to "give teeth to the plan, to convince the parties to implement the plan in its entirety." That is a proposal which presumably has the support of Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who on 9 June repeated his call for an international conference to support the Annan plan attended by inter alia, Iran, saying that "we want this event to be effective. In order to be effective all the sides with any influence on the sides in the Syrian conflict should be represented there. Iran is one such country." On the same day Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov argued that there was no "fundamental difference" between the Russian initiative and Mr Annan's contact group (including Iran's participation). However, other parties involved in the Syrian crisis had more draconian measures in mind. On 10 June the newly elected president of the opposition Syrian National Council (SNC), Kurdish activist 'Abd al-Basit Sida, called on outside countries to "stop the killing machine in a decisive decision under Chapter 7" of the UN Charter, which could authorize actions ranging from sanctions to military intervention. And on 13 June France's new Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius appeared to harden the French position significantly by calling for the six-point Annan plan to be placed within the context of Chapter 7. "We propose making the implementation of the Annan plan compulsory," he announced. "We need to move up a gear at the Security Council and place the Annan plan under Chapter 7 – that is to say to make it compulsory under pain of very heavy sanctions." This is a proposal that at the moment looks like a non-starter. The Russian position, as articulated by Mr Gatilov on 9 June, remains that "introducing restrictive or forceful measures clearly will not foster peace and only aggravate the already difficult atmosphere." And even were the Russians to have a change of heart, the Chinese might well continue to oppose further action by the Security Council. In Beijing Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Weimin, when asked about French proposal the next day, said that "China disapproves of the approach of leaning towards sanctions and pressure. We believe that in the current circumstances, all sides should vigorously support envoy Annan's mediation efforts and urge all sides in Syria to truly implement the UN Security Council's resolution and Annan's six-point proposal."

Charles Snow