1.
GV: Damascus skyline.
0.03

2.
SV INTERIOR: Assad, as audience and officials applaud.
0.16

3.
GV: Audience.
0.18

4.
GV & SV: Assad speaking. (3 SHOTS)
0.46

5.
GV: Audience applauding as Assad waves to audience. (2 SHOTS)
0.58

6.
GV: Assad leaving building and being driven away.
1.23



Initials JS/1610



Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved

Background: Syrian President Hafez Al-Assad has again lashed out at Egypt's President Anwar Sadat for his continued efforts to reach a peace settlement with Israel. The Syrian leader's latest attack came during a speech made at the opening session of the Syrian Teachers Congress in Damascus on Tuesday (9 May).

SYNOPSIS: President Assad went to the teachers congress fresh from talks with Sudanese President Nimeiri, who has been trying to calm tensions in the Arab world caused by President Sadat's peace overtures to Israel. But it seemed President Nimeiri's efforts had not made much impact on the Syrian President, who used the occasion to once again criticise President Sadat's peace moves.

President Assad said in spite of the rift the peace initiative had caused in the Arab world, he was still determined not to accept any part of it now. Syria, he said, would continue to strive for peace as it saw it, but would not back down in its resistance to defeatism and tyranny. President Assad has made it clear on a number of occasions that Syria will not attend a proposed Arab solidarity conference unless President Sadat backs down and denounces his peace efforts as a failure.

His speech at the teachers conference on Tuesday was taken as a clear indication that President Nimeiri's visit had failed to soften the Syrian leader's attitude.