* League resolution calls for supporting Syrian opposition
* Ministers decide to end diplomatic cooperation with Syria
* "Friends of Syria" group to meet in Tunisia on Feb. 24
* Syria, suspended from League, rejects resolution
(Adds comment from League official, diplomat)
CAIRO, Feb 12 (Reuters) - Arab states sought to regain
momentum to end bloodshed in Syria with a call on Sunday for a
joint U.N.-Arab peacekeeping force and renewed efforts to build
international support by hosting a meeting of Arabs and Western
powers later this month.
Syrian swiftly rejected the latest Arab League resolution
that called for supporting the Syrian opposition which has been
demanding an end to the rule of President Bashar al-Assad, who
has sent tanks and troops to quash 11 months of protests.
Arab ministers met in Cairo to revive their diplomatic
efforts that hit the buffers when Russia and China vetoed a U.N.
resolution that was based on a Western-backed Arab peace plan.
As part of those efforts, Tunisia said it would host the
first meeting on Feb. 24 of a "Friends of Syria" contact group
made up of Arab and other states and backed by Western powers.
"How long will we stay as onlookers to what is happening to
the brotherly Syrian people, and how much longer will we grant
the Syrian regime one period after another so it can commit more
massacres against its people?" Saudi Foreign Minister Saud
al-Faisal asked ministers at the start of the League session.
"At our meeting today I call for decisive measures, after
the failure of the half-solutions," he said.
The League resolution said Arabs would scrap a monitoring
mission which they sent to Syria in late December but which was
criticised by Syria's opposition as ineffective from the outset.
It also faced internal dissent and logistical problems.
The Sudanese general leading the observers quit on Sunday.
"I won't work one more time in the framework of the Arab
League," General Mohammed al-Dabi, whose appointment had been
criticised because of Sudan's own rights record, told Reuters.
"I performed my job with full integrity and transparency but
I won't work here again as the situation is skewed," he added.
In place of the Arab team, the League called for the U.N.
Security Council to issue a resolution setting up a joint
U.N.-Arab peacekeeping mission to go to Syria.
League chief Nabil Elaraby floated the idea last week but it
drew only a lukewarm support from diplomats at the United
Nations. The United States and Germany said they were studying
it.
An Arab diplomat last week compared such a mission to the
U.N.-Africa Union military force UNAMID sent to Sudan's Darfur
region. U.N. officials and Western delegations have criticized
UNAMID as ineffective, partly because it is a joint operation.
SYRIA REACTION
The League called for "opening communication channels with
the Syrian opposition and providing all forms of political and
material support to it", and urged the opposition to unite. One
League official said "material" was intended to mean financial.
Syria's ambassador to the League rejected the League
resolution "completely", Syria's state news agency reported. He
said Syria, which has been suspended from the League, would not
accept any resolution decided in its absence.
Lebanon, a neighbour which was long dominated by Syria, and
Algeria voiced reservations, Egypt's state news agency said.
The League resolution said violence against civilians in
Syria had violated international law and "perpetrators deserve
punishment". It also reaffirmed a call for Arabs to implement
economic sanctions on Syria and decided on ending diplomatic
cooperation with Damascus.
Analysts and diplomats say sanctions that Arabs agreed to
impose last year had limited impact so far because Iraq and
other neighbours have not implemented them.
Although the ministers lent their support to the opposition,
the resolution did not recognise the opposition.
Tunisian Foreign Minister Rafik Ben Abdessalem told
reporters that recognising the Syrian National Council was
"premature and requires the opposition get unified".
Ben Abdessalem also announced that Tunisia would host the
meeting of "Friends of Syria", a plan proposed by France and the
United States after Russia and China used their veto.
Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim al-Thani said
the new forum would provide "a good opportunity to try to create
a clear international direction to help the Syrian people to
exit the crisis".
Gulf states, which have led action on Syria, said last week
they were recalling their ambassadors from Syria and expelling
Syria's envoys. Libya and Tunisia, both countries where popular
revolts toppled autocratic rulers last year, have done the same.
Diplomats at the United Nations said Saudi Arabia had
circulated a new draft resolution backing the Arab plan for the
General Assembly, rather than the Security Council, to consider.
Assembly resolutions are non-binding but cannot be vetoed.
However, Riyadh denied on Sunday reports that it had
formally presented the resolution to the assembly.
The League resolution expressed the "disappointment towards
the Russia and Chinese stance which used a veto against
supporting the Arab peace plan".
Egypt's news agency said Elaraby had proposed appointing
former Jordanian minister and U.N. envoy to Libya, Abdel Elah
al-Khatib, as the League's special envoy to Syria. But a source
in the meeting said Khatib's name was not put forward.
(Additional reporting by Tom Perry, Tamim Elyan and Omar Fahmy;
Writing by Edmund Blair; Editing by Myra MacDonald)
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