The caption on this photo says: “Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad laughs during his meeting with United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon (unseen) at the Presidential Palace in Damascus, 24 April 2007”.
The Syrian President looks excruciatingly uncomfortable.
The AFP photo editors wrote, in their caption, that “Ban urged Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Tuesday to press all sides in Lebanon to accept an international trial of Lebanese ex-premier Rafiq Hariri’s suspected assassins”.
The caption written by AP photo editors states that “Ki-moon said before arrival that he would seek Assad’s help in bringing about stability to Lebanon and would also seek Syrian cooperation with Security Council resolutions designed to disarm the Lebanese Hezbollah, end Syria’s influence in Lebanon and establish a tribunal ‘of international character’ to try suspects accused of political assassinations in Beirut”.
UNDOF — the UN Disengagement Observer Force — was stationed in the Golan Heights by the UN Security Council after the 1973 Israeli-Arab War.
