European countries decided to roll over their broad arms embargo on Syria for another three months on Monday, backing away from any push to provide weapons and military equipment to groups fighting President Bashar al-Assad's regime, Wall Street Journal reports.
Still, the European Union agreed to keep the embargo under review and gave the go-ahead to amendments to the arms ban that could allow a broader range of assistance to reach the Syrian opposition over time. The arms embargo was due to expire March 1.
Monday's decision follows several months of debate in Brussels about whether to put greater pressure on the Assad regime by more directly supporting the opposition.
British Foreign Secretary William Hague said Monday the U.K. had hoped for more sweeping changes to allow more equipment to flow to the Syrian rebels.
"There is a very wide range of views on this among the nations of the European Union," Mr. Hague said. "We would have gone further than this; many nations would have made no amendments at all. So this is a compromise."
Mr. Hague said the agreement establishes the principle that the embargo could be relaxed if the situation in Syria doesn't improve.
"It's important because it shows that we can change the arms embargo, and the worse the situation becomes, the more we can change it," Mr. Hague said. "It will be reviewed again in three months. It's established an extremely important precedent."
French Foreign Minsiter Laurent Fabius said the changes meant that "technical assistance and the protection of civilians can be made easier."
One EU diplomat said the changes could prove significant, allowing European countries to provide various forms of training and assistance to the opposition. That could involve helping the opposition to improve security in areas no longer held by the Assad regime or allowing member states to advise the opposition on how to organize ties between its military and civilian commands.
At present, such assistance would fall afoul of the rules, the person said.
In November, France called for defensive weapons to be provided to the opposition, but Paris's support for a broad change to the arms embargo has faded recently. The U.K. had also supported a redrafting of the embargo, although U.K. officials had always stressed they had no plan to start sending arms into Syria.
Last week, the EU's foreign service circulated a paper that gave several options for changing the embargo, including completely lifting it or allowing weapons and equipment to be sent to the opposition.
But in the end, a majority of member states felt any move to further militarize the Syrian conflict could undermine the fragile efforts aimed at a political solution, diplomats said. There were also concerns that arming the opposition could mean weapons falling into the hands of extremist groups in Syria.
"If we must make a change to the embargo...we must be sure that we can control the distribution of weapons and see who are the groups who are going to actually benefit," said Belgian foreign minister Didier Reynders.
In their joint statement Monday afternoon, the EU foreign ministers said they would "actively continue the work under way to assess and review" the embargo. They also said the arms ban would be amended "so as to provide greater nonlethal support and technical assistance for the protection of civilians."