The Syrian president Bashar al-Assad is raising the possibility of Germany acting as a mediator in his country's 30-month-old civil war.
He made the suggestion in an interview with the German magazine Der Spiegel.
The BBC reports that in the interview the Syrian leader said that President Obama offered nothing but lies, while Russia was Syria's true friend.
He said Germany might be suitable for the role of mediator.
Elsewhere in the interview, though, he poured cold water on any negotiated settlement, saying the rebels were not a true political opposition because they were armed.
The Syrian leader did admit that he'd made mistakes. "Even presidents make mistakes," he said, according to the BBC. But he did not say what those mistakes might be.
