Nobody knows how to resolve the crisis in Syria and that includes Kofi Annan, who will resign as the United Nation's special envoy for Syria on August 31, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon announced Thursday. Ban said Annan deserves "our profound admiration for the selfless way in which he has put his formidable skills and prestige to this most difficult and potentially thankless of assignments," noting that the U.N. was discussing plans to find a successor with the Arab League. "I remain convinced that yet more bloodshed is not the answer; each day of it will only make the solution more difficult while bringing deeper suffering to the country and greater peril to the region,"Ban added.

For month's Annan's six-point peace plan, requiring both Syrian security forces and rebels to end hostilities, has been a joke. The plan's goal was to turn down the temperature of violence in the country as a pretext to a political transition of President Bashar al-Assad's regime. But as air bombardments, village massacres, urban warfare and reprisals plagued the country, even Annan acknowledged the plan wasn't working in early July. At its worst, Annan's plan provided Assad time to kill as many rebels as possible. In its defense, it was one of the few options available outside an international military intervention. Activists estimate that about 20,000 people have died since  the protests began in March of last year. You can read the entire U.N. statement here.

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John Hudson