Syrian President Bashar al-Assad insisted on Thursday that what has been happening in Syria for more than two years is not a revolution and argued that those plotting against his regime had "used up all their tools", dpa reported.
Al-Assad's remarks came in an interview with the pro-regime newspaper al-Thawara. In it, the embattled president accused what he described "the enemies of Syria" of trying to destroy the country.
"The countries that conspire against Syria have used up all their tools and means ... and they have nothing left except direct [military] intervention," Assad said. "So if we can overcome this stage with awareness, we have nothing more to fear."
More than 93,000 people, according to UN estimates, have been killed since the crisis in Syria erupted in March 2011. The conflict began with peaceful protests against al-Assad's rule, then deepened after some in the opposition took up arms to confront the harsh government crackdown on dissent.
Al-Assad said in the interview that he believes he still enjoys the support of most of the Syrian people, and that his opponents had failed to oust his government because they had brought "religion onto the battlegrounds."
Using the example of the ousting of Egypt's Mohammed Morsi, al-Assad said: "What is happening in Egypt is the fall of so-called political Islam."
Those "who use religion for political interests or for the interests of one group will fall," he said.
According to al-Assad, the Muslim Brotherhood's rule had failed even before it properly started because "this kind of rule is not consistent with the nature of the people" and because it aims at creating "sedition in the Arab world."
Al-Assad's interview came as the Western-backed opposition Syrian National Coalition was meeting in Istanbul for talks on electing a new leadership.
George Sabra has been heading the coalition as interim president since Moaz Al-Khatib, a cleric, resigned in March.
Meanwhile, inside Syria, an aide to the Syrian labour minister was wounded when a bomb planted under his car exploded in Damascus, activists said.
The blast occurred in the district of al-Baramekah, wounding the official, Rakan Ibrahim, the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Elsewhere, at least six people were killed, among them five from the same family, when government forces shelled a village in the southern province of Daraa.