YEREVAN, DECEMBER 5, ARMENPRESS. Syrian government forces’ advance strengthens President Bashar al-Assad’s positions, “Noravank” Foundation’s Chairman Gagik Harutyunyan told a press conference in “Armenpress”.

“Assad’s troops have great progress, the Russian air forces greatly contribute to it. Nearly 50% of Eastern Aleppo is under Assad’s control, this is a major victory. I have no doubt the government forces will capture the eastern part of Aleppo until the end. Recently, extremists started to escape, some of them surrender. This gives hope that the situation will be somehow improved”, Gagik Harutyunyan said.

Referring to the view that Federica Mogherini announced that the advance of the government forces means nothing, Gagik Harutyunyan said the Syrian army achieves serious success, its advantage is obvious. He said of course, at this stage there would not be a negotiation process in which Assad will take part, but this progress creates good preconditions for strengthening his positions within the country.

On the one hand the Syrian army achieves success, and on the other hand, the Turkish troops intensified their actions in Aleppo Governorate. Gagik Harutyunyan said this is a violation of the international law. From the perspective of international law, only Iran and Russia have Assad’s permission to be there.

“Turkey’s activeness can be explained by the fact that it tries to take its part from Syria. It is supposed Syria will not remain in its previous form, Syria will be divided, and Turkey wants to benefit from this process”, he said.

He said during the war Syria suffered a great damage. The damages reach to 1 trillion. This put the country in a critical situation. The Armenian community also became small in numbers. Today with optimistic calculations 10 thousand Armenians remained in the city.