Syria Support Movement solidarity with the Syrian people
from the News Desk at The Cradle, March 14, 2023
Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Ayman Sousan stated that Syria’s participation in a possible meeting of the deputy foreign ministers of Turkiye, Syria, Iran, and Russia is still “under discussion.”
Al-Mayadeen reports that Sousan made the comments in an exclusive statement to the Russian news agency Sputnik in response to a question about whether Syria would participate in the four-way meeting to be held in Moscow on 15 and 16 March. “We are looking at the subject,” Sousan explained.
Citing diplomatic sources, Turkish broadcaster TRT reported on 13 March that the meeting would be attended by Turkish Deputy Foreign Minister Burak Akjabar, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov, Political Affairs Adviser to the Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Asghar Haji, and Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Sousan.
The Syrian newspaper Al-Watan reported on 14 March that Damascus wanted Turkiye to agree to certain conditions before officially announcing its participation in the meeting.
Al-Watan wrote that it learned that “serious deliberations are still ongoing to reach the holding of the meeting, which may be scheduled at any moment if those deliberations reach positive results.”
According to the newspaper, this means that Damascus must “get the guarantees it wants from the Turkish side to announce a withdrawal schedule from Syrian territory and to stop supporting terrorist groups.”
Turkiye was a key participant in the US-backed war on Syria that began in 2011. Washington and its regional allies, including Turkiye, armed and funded militias, including the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front and ISIS, in an effort to topple the Syrian government.
The Nusra Front conquered Syria’s northwest Idlib province in the Spring of 2015 at the head of a coalition of armed opposition groups known as Jaish al-Fatah, or the Army of Conquest.
The United States, Turkiye, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar all provided arms to the Jaish al Fatah coalition, including US-supplied TOW anti-tank missiles. The Nusra Front, now known as Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), led by Abu Muhammad al Julani, occupied Idlib province with continued Turkish support since that time.
Turkish troops entered Idlib province directly in 2017, setting up observation outposts as part of the Astana negotiations led by Russia.
In 2019, Turkiye reorganized what was left of the various Salafist militias formerly comprising the Free Syrian Army (FSA) to form the Syrian National Army (SNA), which also occupies territory in northwestern Syria near Aleppo. The SNA continues to function as Turkiye’s proxy.
The withdrawal of Turkish support for HTS and the SNA, which Damascus considers terrorist groups, will therefore be an important issue of discussion if the four-way meeting in Moscow takes place.
