Saturday 14 / December / 2024
Syrians have spent the day celebrating in the streets following the first Friday prayers since the fall of the Bashar Assad regime. Huge crowds crammed into the Umayyad Mosque in the capital Damascus, with the newly installed caretaker prime minister telling worshippers that the country was looking at new beginnings. DW takes a closer look at celebrations.
Qatar sending delegation to meet Syrian interim government
Qatar will send its first official delegation to Damascus on Sunday to meet Syria's interim government and discuss reopening the Qatari embassy and enhancing humanitarian aid deliveries, according to AFP news agency and Reuters.
"They will take the necessary steps to reopen the embassy and discuss enhancing aid delivery," Reuters quoted an official as saying.
Doha closed its diplomatic mission in Damascus and recalled its ambassador in July 2011 after a peaceful uprising against Bashar Assad's government spiraled into a 13-year civil war.
From the start of the popular uprisings in Syria in 2011, Qatar played a role supporting the opposition to the Assad regime, initially in partnership with two other Gulf countries, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, and Turkey. In a video conference, G7 leaders on Friday said they hopef that Syria will have a "peaceful and orderly transition," following the fall of Assad's regime.
The G7 group, consisting of the US, Canada, France, UK, Germany, Italy and Japan, also called for an "inclusive political process."
After the G7 virtual meeting, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer urged for caution regarding Syria's future, saying the country required "credible, inclusive and non-sectarian governance on behalf of all Syrians."
"All leaders agreed that Syria's territorial integrity, independence and sovereignty must be respected throughout the transition process and in future," a spokesperson for Starmer added.
Blinken says determined to keep ISIS militants at bay
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the US was determined to make sure "that Daesh cannot re-emerge," referring to the Arabic acronym for the so-called "Islamic State."
The US top diplomat made an unannounced visit to Iraq on Friday, where he met Mohammed Shia al-Sudani to discuss Syria's political transition following the fall of the Assad regime.
He visited the US embassy in Baghdad and told reporters he discussed the situation in Syria with the Iraqi prime minister.
"As Syria transitions from the Assad dictatorship to hopefully a democracy, it does so in a way that, of course, protects all of the minorities in Syria that produces an inclusive, nonsectarian government and does not become, in any way, a platform for terrorism," Blinken said.
"No one knows the importance of that more than Iraq, because of the ongoing presence of ISIS or Daesh in Syria, and
we are determined to make sure that Daesh cannot reemerge," he added.
Following Iraq, Blinken heads back to Jordan, where he will attend a meeting of Arab and Turkish foreign ministers to discuss Syria.
