The situation at a glance: Hope for a peaceful transition process in Syria

The situation at a glance: Hope for a peaceful transition process in Syria

The situation at a glance
Hope for a peaceful transition process in Syria






The civil war-torn country of Syria faces an uncertain future after the coup. Representatives of the international community want to help with the transition. Meanwhile, the war in the Gaza Strip continues.

After the fall of Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad, the world is hoping for a peaceful transition to new political leadership. At a crisis summit in Jordan today, foreign ministers from Arab states will discuss the future of the country, which has been torn by dictatorship and civil war, with international representatives. The heads of state and government of the group of seven leading industrial nations (G7) called for a “comprehensive political process” in a video link, said Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni as acting G7 chairwoman.

Meanwhile, Turkey is reopening its embassy in the Syrian capital Damascus today, Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said, according to the Turkish news agency Anadolu. The embassy was closed in 2012 due to the deteriorating security situation during the civil war.

Crisis summit discusses Syria’s future

The Turkish Foreign Minister himself will meet with his colleagues from Arab states at the crisis summit in Jordan today. According to Jordanian information, these include ministers from Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Qatar.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas and UN special envoy for Syria Geir Pedersen are also taking part in the summit in the city of Aqaba. Jordan’s Foreign Ministry said that ways should be explored to support Syria in the transition phase. The aim is to initiate a political process under Syrian leadership that includes all groups in the fragmented country.

Report: Syria’s rebels have been planning a coup for a year

A rebel alliance led by the Haiat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) overthrew the authoritarian ruler Bashar al-Assad, who has ruled for 24 years, on Sunday. He fled to Russia, where he received asylum. Concrete planning for Assad’s overthrow began a year ago, said Abu Hassan al-Hamwi, head of the military wing of the HTS, to the British Guardian.

But preparations have been going on for years, he said. Significant territorial losses were suffered in 2019 due to attacks by Assad troops. All groups recognized “that the fundamental problem was the lack of unified command and control over the fight,” he said.

The HTS then took control of other opposition groups in the northwest and then slowly molded its fighters into a disciplined fighting force using a military doctrine developed by the HTS, he said. In late November, the rebel alliance felt the time was ripe for its offensive, as Assad’s key allies were preoccupied with other conflicts: Russia was fighting in Ukraine, while Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah were weakened by the fight with Israel.

Scholz: Europe will support the reconstruction of Syria

Meanwhile, Chancellor Olaf Scholz promised help in rebuilding Syria. “Europe will also help with reconstruction,” said the SPD politician in his “Chancellor Compact” video, which was published on the X platform. After all the suffering, Syrians deserve a life of freedom and security. It is the task of the new rulers to ensure this. “We will work with them on this basis,” said Scholz.

After the coup in Syria, the chairman of the CDU, Friedrich Merz, is calling for stricter controls at European borders to prevent Assad’s supporters from entering the country. “We Europeans must now work together as quickly as possible to ensure that the Assad regime’s accomplices from the second and third ranks do not come to Europe and Germany unrecognized as asylum seekers,” said the Union’s candidate for chancellor to the “Rheinische Post”. The EU must now control its external borders very strictly.

After the change of power, Turkey is seen as the most influential foreign actor in Syria. “Ankara has the strongest communication channels and has a long history of working with the Islamist group that is currently in charge in Damascus,” wrote analyst Gönül Tol in Foreign Affairs magazine. They have no control over the HTS, but have made it clear to the group that they hope for a peaceful transition, a person in Ankara familiar with the matter told dpa.

War in the Gaza Strip continues

Meanwhile, the war in the Gaza Strip between Israel and the Islamist Hamas continues. The Israeli Air Force said it once again attacked a Hamas command center in the city of Gaza in the north of the sealed-off coastal strip. The army said that night that it was in a building that had previously been a school. The attack was aimed at Hamas terrorists who were planning attacks on Israel’s troops in Gaza and on Israeli territory “in the immediate future.” Before the “precise attack”, numerous measures were taken to reduce the danger to civilians. The army’s information could not be independently verified.

No information was given about possible victims. The army had previously announced that two rockets had been fired from Gaza into Israel. They were intercepted, it was said. Rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip, which has been under dispute for more than a year, have been rare recently.

The war was triggered by the massacre by Palestinian terrorists from the coastal area in Israel on October 7th last year, with 1,200 dead and around 250 abducted. Since then, Israel has been fighting against the Islamist Hamas in Gaza, where, according to Palestinian figures, almost 45,000 people have been killed so far. The numbers do not differentiate between fighters and civilians.

dpa

Source: Stern

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