Russia does not believe in regime change imposed by external forces whether political or military. Moscow signed up for intervention in Libya and got their fingers badly singed. Libya was the latest in a long list of western interventionist failures including Haiti, Somalia, Kosova and Iraq.

The other politician who says the situation in Syria is strategically more complex is the Egyptian Amr Moussa, who for ten years was the Secretary General of the Arab League. Mr. Moussa, a candidate in the recent Egyptian presidential elections, says the Syria case has no parallels with Libya.

He also said, in interview with RT on Saturday, that the west has no plan for Syria.

Given the chaos in Iraq and the continuing lack of order in Libya one has to wonder if they had plans for these earlier interventions.

As Egypt is about to find out, religion and politics are separate. Politics is ruled by the constitution while religion should stay in the mosque.

This lack of separation of religion from the parliament is why the Democratic Party of Libya is boycotting the forthcoming elections of the General National Congress.

The Democratic Party was the first Libyan political party to be established on 14th  July 2011.

It’s founder, Ahmed Shebani, writes me that  The DP makes secularism the cornerstone of its political philosophy and programme,” but unlike the Turkish experience our secularism is derived from Islam itself. It is now the time to make the separation between mosque and state in order for us to emerge from our dark ages and reclaim our lost dignity”.

“Evidently, the DP's ideological and political vision is both new and unique. Its implementation will require nothing less than a new movement of religious renewal and a concerted political campaign. “Clearly, it is impossible to establish a genuine democracy while Muslim political thought remains a prisoner to the notion of the Sultan as the shadow of God on Earth. It is a scandalous misrepresentation of Islam which makes happiness in this world and in the world to come a matter of total obedience to rulers. It makes Islam a tyrannical religion which practically fails to make any distinction between the will of God and that of the ruler. It is polytheism pure and simple,” Ahmed declares.

Ahmed Shebani has a wiser head on his shoulders than Hilary Clinton who has forgotten how The Lebanon was once torn by rival militias each drawing their support from a different master. In the game that led to the civil war Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq and Israel all had their fingers and proxy armies. That scenario is now being replicated in Syria.