Terrorism is a state of mind that on the one hand has to do with ignorance and, on the other hand, can be attributed to a feeling of desperation over the political situation, which at some point takes the form of revenge.

Any cooperation that doesn't go through the Syrian government is not legal. If it's not legal, we cannot cooperate with, and we don't recognize and we don't accept.

There can be no peace without unity.

On the border area with Lebanon where [Hezbollah forces] want to protect themselves and cooperate with us, but they don't exist all over Syria.

I have to be very clear and very honest. I'm not asking [ the American officials] to believe if they don't want to believe. This is reality, I'm telling you the reality from our country. We live here, we know what is happening, and they have to listen to people here. They cannot listen only to their media or to their research centers. They don't live here ; no one lives here but us.

We're not in the area where the alleged chemical attack happened. I said alleged. We're not sure that anything happened.

If you want to talk about mistakes, every country has mistakes, every government has mistakes, every person has mistakes. When you have a war, you have more mistakes. That's the natural thing.