The Prime Minister in charge of the transition in Syria, Mohammad al-Bashir, assured Wednesday that the coalition of rebels which ousted Bashar al-Assad from power would guarantee the rights of all communities. He called on the millions of exiled Syrians to return.
While Western countries are worried about how the new power, dominated by the radical Islamist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the former Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda, will treat the many minorities in Syria, Mr. Bachir wanted to reassure.
“It is precisely because we are Muslims that we will guarantee the rights of all peoples and all faiths in Syria,” he said in an interview with the Italian daily Corriere della Sera, the day after his nomination for lead a transitional government until March 1.
HTS claims to have broken with jihadism but remains classified as a terrorist by several Western countries, including the United States.
Syrians called to return
Mr. Bachir also called on Syrians abroad to return home to “rebuild” the country where Sunnis, Alawites, Christians, Druze and even Kurds live.
Some six million Syrians, a quarter of the population, have fled the country since 2011, when the repression of pro-democracy protests led to a devastating war.
“Now a free country”
Fragmented by 13 years of conflict, which left more than half a million dead, “Syria is now a free country which has gained its pride and its dignity. Come back,” he proclaimed.
After the capture of Damascus on Sunday by the rebels, at the end of a dazzling eleven-day offensive, several countries, including Germany, Austria, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, froze the procedures for requests for assistance. asylum for Syrian nationals.
In Damascus, where the flag of the revolution flies, green, white and black, life is slowly returning to normal. Coming to meet friends in a café, Rania Diab, a 64-year-old doctor, nourishes the hope “that we can live normally in our country, that our freedoms are preserved”.
Search for the missing
But for many Syrians, the priority remains the search for missing loved ones caught up in decades of fierce repression.
Coming from Deraa, in the south, Nabil Hariri examines photos of corpses in the morgue of a hospital in the capital, looking for his brother, arrested in 2014 at barely 13 years old. “When you’re drowning, you hold on to anything,” said the 39-year-old.
Since 2011, more than 100,000 people have died in Syrian prisons, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, OSDH, estimated in 2022.
Prosecutions planned
Abu Mohammad al-Jolani, the head of HTS, who led the rebel offensive launched on November 27, reaffirmed Wednesday that “those involved in the torture and elimination of detainees” would be prosecuted, and called for their surrender by the country where they fled.
Rebel fighters set fire to the tomb of the ousted president’s father and predecessor, Hafez al-Assad, in his home village in the coastal region of Latakia, according to AFP footage.
Several foreign capitals and the UN have taken note of the signals sent by the new power, while stressing that they must be translated into action and warning against foreign interference.
The UN is “fully committed to supporting a smooth transition,” its Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Wednesday.
Blinken in Jordan and Turkey
The head of American diplomacy, Antony Blinken will have talks on Syria on Thursday in Jordan and Friday in Turkey, during which he “will reiterate the support of the United States for an inclusive transition (…) towards a responsible and representative government “, according to the State Department.
Berlin, for its part, urged Turkey, which supports rebel groups facing the Kurds, and Israel, mobilized to prevent any threat from the neighboring country, not to jeopardize the transition in Syria.
Russia, hitherto support of the deposed power and where Mr. Assad fled, wanted a situation “stabilized as quickly as possible”, indicating that it was “in contact” with the new authorities, in particular concerning the future of the two military bases Russians in the country.
Qatar has announced the upcoming reopening of its embassy in Syria, with which it had severed ties under the former power.
Truce on the Kurdish front
As experts and foreign capitals warn of fighting between different groups in the country, clashes between pro-Turkish rebels and pro-Kurdish forces have left 218 dead in three days in the Manbij region in northern Syria, said Tuesday the OSDH.
The leader of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF, dominated by the Kurds and supported by the United States), which controls large areas of northeastern Syria, announced on Wednesday a truce via American mediation with pro-Turkish groups.
Tuesday evening, rebels also claimed to have seized the town of Deir Ezzor, in the east of the country, which was controlled by Kurdish forces, according to the OSDH.
Israeli attacks
For its part, Israel displays its determination not to allow “any hostile force to establish itself on its border” in Syria, in the words of its Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.
The Israeli army said on Tuesday that it had carried out hundreds of attacks across the neighboring country in 48 hours against strategic military sites “to prevent them from falling into the hands of terrorist elements”.
This article was automatically published. Sources: ats / afp