KEY POINTS
- US, EU, Turkey, and Arab nations convene in Jordan to discuss Syria.
- Turkey resumes diplomatic ties with Syria.
- UN envoy emphasizes the need to prevent institutional collapse in Syria.
- The EU plans to engage with Syria’s interim government.
AQABA, Jordan: Top diplomats from the United States, the European Union, Turkey and Arab nations met in Jordan on Saturday for talks on Syria as regional and global powers scramble for influence over whatever government replaces ousted President Bashar al-Assad.
Outgoing US President Joe Biden’s administration has begun engaging with the Syrian groups including Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS), which led a lightning offensive that ended in the capture of Damascus on Sunday.
Biden sent Secretary of State Antony Blinken to the region this week to seek support for principles that Washington hopes will guide Syria’s political transition, such as respect for minorities.
Meanwhile, Syria’s northern neighbour Turkey has for years supported Syrian opposition forces looking to oust Assad and is poised to play an influential role in Damascus.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said on Friday that his country’s embassy in the Syrian capital would resume work on Saturday after Turkey’s intelligence chief visited this week.
Syria’s neighbour Jordan was hosting Saturday’s gathering in Aqaba. Russia and Iran were not invited.
No Syrian Representative in Talks
Blinken, UN Special Envoy for Syria Geir Pederson and EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, Fidan and foreign ministers from Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Qatar met around a circular table at a Jordanian government guesthouse.
There was no Syrian representative at the table. The Arab diplomats earlier met separately, Arab News reported.
Blinken, meeting Pederson at his hotel earlier on Saturday, said it was a time of “both opportunity but also real challenge” for Syria.
Arab diplomats attending the talks said they were seeking assurances from Turkey that it supports an inclusive political process that prevents partition of Syria.
Blinken told Turkish officials during a visit to Ankara on Thursday and Friday that Daesh must not be able to regroup, and the SDF must not be distracted from its role of securing camps holding Daesh fighters, Reuters reported citing a US official with the US delegation.
Fidan told Turkish TV later on Friday that the elimination of the YPG was Turkey’s “strategic target” and urged the group’s commanders to leave Syria.
A UN envoy on Saturday urged foreign powers to work to avoid a collapse of vital Syrian institutions following the downfall of Assad, as diplomats gathered in Jordan for a conference on the crisis.
Geir Pedersen, the UN’s special envoy for Syria, also backed a “credible and inclusive” political process to form the next government as he met US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
“We need to make sure that state institutions do not collapse, and that we get in humanitarian assistance as quickly as possible,” Pedersen said.
“If we can achieve that, perhaps there is a new opportunity for the Syrian people.”
Turkey to Reopen Embassy in Damascus
Turkey, meanwhile, will reopen its embassy in Damascus, closed since 2012 amid calls by Ankara for Assad to step down.
A Qatari diplomat said a delegation from the Gulf emirate would visit Syria on Sunday to meet transitional government officials and discuss aid and the reopening of their embassy.
Israel bombs military sites in Syria
Israel’s latest strikes hit military sites in the Eastern Qalamun region, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor said Saturday.
Israel has also sent troops into a UN-patrolled buffer zone that separated Israeli and Syrian forces on the Golan Heights, in a move the UN said violated a 1974 armistice.
The army has been ordered to “prepare to remain” there throughout the winter, Defence Minister Israel Katz’s office said Friday.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan told private NTV television that his country had urged Russia and Iran not to intervene militarily “to ensure minimum loss of life”.
Tears of Joy
Ahmed al-Sharaa, head of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) which spearheaded the offensive, had called on Syrians “to go to the streets to express their joy”.
Celebrations continued into the night on the first Friday since Assad took flight.
Umayyad Square in Damascus was jammed with vehicles, people and waving flags as fireworks shot into the air, AFPTV live images showed.
Thousands flocked to the capital’s landmark Umayyad Mosque, some raising the three-star Syrian independence flag that none dared wave in the capital during Assad’s rule.
Crowds also gathered in the squares and streets of other Syrian cities, including Homs, Hama and Idlib.
There was a festive and relaxed atmosphere as hundreds rallied in the main square of Syria’s second city Aleppo.
During celebrations in the city of Sweida, a girl leaps from a toppled Ahmad Abd al-Majed, 39, an engineer who returned to Aleppo from Turkey, said that many shed “tears of joy and happiness”.
The historic Umayyad Mosque in Damascus saw long lineups for the “Syrians deserve to be happy,” he said.
In the southern city of Sweida, the heartland of Syria’s Druze minority, Bayan al-Hinnawi, 77, never believed he would live to see such a day.
“It’s a wonderful sight. Nobody could have imagined this could happen”, said Hinnawi, who spent 17 years in prison.
Tens of Thousands Missing
The interim government insists the rights of all Syrians will be protected — as will the rule of law.
The European Union was seeking “to establish contacts” with the new rulers soon, an EU official told AFP on condition of anonymity.
The UN refugee agency said the new government had sent “constructive” initial signals, including asking the organisation to stay in the country.
Leaders of the Group of Seven (G7) democratic countries, who met virtually on Friday, expressed hope for “a peaceful and orderly transition through the definition of an inclusive political process” in Syria.
Inside much of Syria, the focus is turning towards unravelling the secrets of Assad’s rule, particularly the network of detention centres and suspected torture sites.
Syrians have descended upon prisons, hospitals and morgues in search of long-disappeared loved ones.
“I turned the world upside down looking,” Abu Mohammed told AFP as he searched for news of three missing relatives at the Mazzeh airbase in Damascus.
“We just want a hint of where they were.”
The International Committee of the Red Cross said it documented more than 35,000 disappearances during Assad’s rule, with the actual number likely far higher.
While Syrians celebrate the end of Assad’s rule, they face a struggle for necessities in a country ravaged by war, sanctions and runaway inflation.
On Friday, the EU announced the launch of an “air bridge” operation to deliver an initial 50 tonnes of health supplies via neighbouring Turkey.
