Cyprus meeting sees EU consensus on Syria sanctions

EU foreign ministers agreed on the need to beef up sanctions against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime at talks in Cyprus on Saturday, Cypriot Foreign Minister Erato Kozakou-Marcoullis said speaking Saturday at a joint press conference with EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Catherine Ashton, following the conclusion of the two-day meeting of the EU Foreign Ministers in the coastal city of Paphos, in the framework of the Cyprus EU Presidency. "There is consensus also on the increase of sanctions in Syria," she said, after announcing that the bloc's 27 ministers had agreed on the need to massively strengthen humanitarian aid. She also said European nations were intent on working with Moscow, Assad's main diplomatic and military supporter. Ashton said that the Union is adamant that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad "should go" and that there needs to be political transition to inclusive democracy for the people of Syria and for the future. Asthon noted that the humanitarian crisis is an absolute priority as the numbers of refugees are increasing dramatically. More than 1.2 million, over than half of them children, have become internally displaced in Syria, and some 200,000 refugees are massed in neighbors Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey and Iraq.