UN draft is a 'declaration of war' on Syria-envoy

* UN rights committee to vote on Syria rebuke Tuesday

* Five Arab states co-sponsor the European draft

By Louis Charbonneau

UNITED NATIONS, Nov 21 (Reuters) - Syria's U.N. envoy on Monday slammed a draft U.N. resolution condemning the Syrian government's eight-month crackdown on pro-democracy protesters, calling it a "declaration of war" on Damascus.

Syrian Ambassador Bashar Ja'afari was referring to a draft resolution on Syria which Germany submitted to the U.N. General Assembly's human rights committee. The draft, which was crafted by Germany, Britain and France, has five Arab states among its 61 co-sponsors.

"This was tabled in the context of declaring a political and media and diplomatic war on my country," Ja'afari told the committee, which is comprised of the 193 U.N. member states.

"It is a declaration of war that aims to affect the independence of our political decision-making and stop us from moving ahead in our national political agendas," he said.

Syria has promised the United Nations that it would halt military operations against civilians and implement political reforms. But U.N. officials say Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has failed to keep any of his promises.

The draft resolution says the committee "strongly condemns the continued grave and systematic human rights violations by the Syrian authorities, such as arbitrary executions, excessive use of force and the persecution and killing of protesters and human rights defenders."