MOSCOW. Oct 22 (Interfax) - Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is a guarantor of the security of national minorities in Syria who still enjoys support from a significant number of citizens, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in his answers to questions from Rossiyskaya Gazeta.
"Bashar al-Assad is a guarantor of the security of national minorities, among them Christians, who have been living in Syria for centuries," he said.
"By the most conservative estimates our Western partners quote in confidential meetings, he still enjoys support of at least a third of residents as a man bound to prevent Syria's transformation into a place where minorities will be simply unable to live and to exist," Lavrov said.