Pat Dollard | Young Americans

World Tribune

Monday, June 9, 2008

LONDON — Syrian President Bashar Assad reportedly blocked a coup planned by his brother-in-law who has disappeared from public view.

The German daily Die Welt reported that Assad foiled a coup by his brother-in-law, Assaf Chawkat, in February 2008. The newspaper said Chawkat, then Syrian intelligence chief, attempted to overthrow Assad in cooperation with the opposition Muslim Brotherhood and Al Qaida.

Assad was said to have been informed of the coup plans by Hizbullah operational chief Imad Mughniyeh. Days later, the newspaper said, Mughniyeh was assassinated by Chawkat’s agents in Damascus.

“The seizure of power was planned to take place during the meeting of the Arab League at the end of March in Damascus,” Die Welt said on Saturday.

Since the coup attempt, Die Welt said, Assad deposed Chawkat and placed him under house arrest. Chawkat, who at one point, was endorsed by exiled Syrian Vice President Abdul Halim Khaddam, has not been seen in public since.

“More than 100 secret service officers, who worked for Chakwat, are in detention,” Die Welt said.

Still, Chawkat, appointed intelligence chief in 2005, would probably not be prosecuted for the coup attempt. Die Welt said Assad did not want to harm his sister, Bushra, married to Chawkat. Syria has denied the newspaper report.

“Bushra was sent abroad — first to France and then the United Arab Emirates,” Die Welt said.

From earlier this year at ….

Free Syria

Abu Dhabi gives Bouchra al-Assad political asylum…

Assad’s anger towards Asef Chawkat keeps growing with the launch of the International Tribunal

Political sources confirmed that Bouchra al-Assad, wife of the Syrian Colonel Asef Chawkat, has managed to get political asylum in the United Arab Emirates.

The Emirati leadership had already tried to solve the differences between Bouchra and her brother the Syrian President Bachar al-Assad but these attempts failed after the assassination of the military leader of Hezbollah Imad Moghniyeh in Damascus.

Bouchra al-Assad moved along with her children to Paris before she went back to the Emirates ten days ago.

Meanwhile, unconfirmed rumors say that Asef Chawkat might be held in house arrest in Syria and is therefore banned from traveling. There are signs of harsher measures taken against him by orders of the President.

These developments come in parallel with the launch of the initial steps of the International Tribunal and shortly after Daniel Belmar presented his report about the Hariri assassination to the Security Council. The Syrian leadership is going through an unprecedented state of anxiety because of strict messages warning the regime about imminent dangers especially after more than half of the Arab leaders boycotted the Damascus Summit because of the Syrian behavior that brought the Iranian factor to Palestine, Lebanon, and Iraq and even into Syria after allowing an unprecedented “Shiification” campaign in the Umayyad capital.