Syrian President Bashar Al Assad received Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan in Damascus yesterday in the most significant step yet towards ending Syria’s decade-long regional isolation, and at a time of wider rapprochement in the region.
It was the first visit of a top diplomat from Saudi Arabia to Damascus since ties were ruptured following Assad’s deadly crackdown on protesters in 2011 – violence that escalated into a decade-long civil war.
The meeting discussed steps needed for a political solution to Syria’s conflict that would preserve its Arab identity and return it to ‘its Arab surroundings’, Saudi state media said.
Assad said the kingdom’s ‘open and realistic policies’ benefited the region, Syria’s state news agency reported.
The statements made no mention of an Arab League summit that Riyadh is due to host next month. On Friday, Gulf foreign ministers and their counterparts from Egypt, Iraq and Jordan discussed Syria’s possible return to the body at a meeting in Saudi Arabia.
Following the security forces’ crackdown on demonstrators in 2011, Syria’s membership in the Arab League was suspended.
Assad later regained control over much of Syria. The two sides agreed to resume diplomatic ties, and sources had earlier told Reuters that Bin Farhan would travel to Damascus to invite Assad to the Arab League summit.
While some countries like the UAE have also mended ties with Damascus, others such as Qatar remain opposed to normalisation and to readmitting Syria to the Arab League in the absence of a political solution to the conflict.
Syria’s foreign minister, who recently visited Saudi Arabia, Algeria and Tunisia, has said Arab League would be ‘almost impossible before correcting bilateral relations’.
The thaw in relations between Riyadh and Damascus is part of a wider trend that has seen Saudi Arabia and Iran agree to restore ties in a regional realignment aimed at easing tensions.
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