Syria’s President Assad would ‘welcome house refugees’

Aug 10, 2023 at 2:41 AM

Syrian President Bashar al Assad has mentioned he would welcome house refugees who escaped the nation’s long-running civil conflict.

In an unique interview with Sky News Arabia, he blamed the nation’s financial state of affairs as the explanation why refugees should not returning to their homeland, pointing to the “image of war” in Syria for the shortage of much-needed worldwide funding in its financial system.

“Over the last few years we’ve seen just under half a million people return and none of them were harmed,” he mentioned.

“What’s stopped more from coming back is the economic situation.

“How can a refugee return with out electrical energy or faculty for his youngsters or medical remedy? These are life’s necessities.

“That’s the reason.

“We pardoned all refugees who got here again other than individuals who dedicated severe crimes.”

But a number of human rights teams and worldwide organisations together with the United Nations, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have mentioned it’s unsafe for refugees to return to Syria.

Those who’ve returned confronted “grave human rights abuses and persecution at the hands of the Syria government and affiliated militias”, Human Rights Watch mentioned.

Syria is topic to robust US sanctions – referred to as the Caesar Act – which President Assad says “is an obstacle without doubt but it is not the biggest obstacle”.

“The biggest obstacle is the terrorist demolishing the infrastructure. The biggest obstacle is the image of war in Syria which prohibits any investor from dealing with the Syrian market,” he mentioned.

Syria’s foreign money is collapsing and the nation is affected by an absence of electrical energy, drugs and every day necessities, regardless of assist from Russia and Iran.

War in Syria broke out in 2011, with August 2023 marking ten years since then President Obama determined to not bomb Syria after chemical weapons had been used within the nation.

President Assad has now regained management of the capital Damascus and most city areas.

The conflict rages on with the UN estimating that greater than 300,000 civilians had been killed within the first decade of the battle.

In the 12-year battle, greater than half of the nation’s 22 million pre-war inhabitants fled their houses with the civil conflict a significant factor in Europe’s migrant disaster.

The governments of Canada and the Netherlands lately filed torture complaints in opposition to Syria within the International Court of Justice over the “unlawful killing” of hundreds of civilians.

Assad’s energy nonetheless restricted regardless of comeback

It is ten years, to the month, since President Obama determined on the final minute to not bomb Syria after chemical weapons had been used within the nation.

In the years since, tens of hundreds extra individuals have been killed in preventing and the civil conflict continues – however President Bashar al Assad has regained management of the capital, Damascus, and most city areas in Syria.

Millions of Syrians fled the preventing and are nonetheless refugees, unable to return to their houses.

Many have tried to make the harmful sea crossings into Europe – the Syrian civil conflict is a big issue within the migrant disaster on European shores.

Assad’s declare within the interview with Sky News Arabia, that he would welcome the refugees house, ignores the fact that many do not need to return to a rustic underneath his rule.

With elements of Syria nonetheless in insurgent fingers, Assad can not declare outright victory, however he’s being accepted again into the Arab world.

He desperately wants funding with Syria’s financial system going through robust US sanctions, its foreign money collapsing and an absence of electrical energy, drugs and every day necessities.

Support from his allies – Russia and Iran – will not be sufficient.

Bashar al Assad is displaying confidence to journey overseas once more and is beginning to rebuild his energy. That energy is restricted although.

He might need survived the Arab Spring when most leaders did not however he’s nonetheless a pariah within the West, accused of conflict crimes, and his nation continues to be at conflict and in ruins.

But accusations of conflict crimes in opposition to President Assad haven’t stopped him from slowly being reaccepted by Middle Eastern leaders.

He lately attended the annual Arab League summit after he was suspended by the alliance throughout his crackdown on pro-democracy protests that led to the breakout of the civil conflict.

Read extra:
Syria’s neighbours have accepted Assad has won the war
Arab League votes to readmit Syria

President Assad additionally mentioned fleeing Syria throughout the conflict was “never on the cards” for him.

He instructed Sky News Arabia: “There were no internal demands for the president to depart. It’s important for a president to leave, or to leave his responsibilities to be more precise, when the people demand it – not due to external interference or external wars.

“When it is as a result of inner causes that is regular however when it is due to exterior conflict that is referred to as escape or to flee. And me fleeing was by no means on the playing cards.”