Syria | Pakistan

In Syria’s Druze-majority city of Sweida, residents said they have been living in terror since the arrival of government forces who have been carrying out what witnesses and a war monitor have called summary executions. Syrian government forces entered the majority-Druze city of Sweida on Tuesday with the stated aim of overseeing a ceasefire agreed with Druze community leaders following days of fighting with local Bedouin tribes. Syria’s Druze community follows a religion derived from Islam and is part of a minority group that also has members in Lebanon, Israel, and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. In Syria, the community is concentrated in the Sweida region bordering Jordan, in areas adjoining the Israeli-occupied Golan, and in Damascus’ Jaramana suburb. Echoing arrangements for the Alawites, French colonial authorities established a state called Jabal al-Druze centred on Sweida until 1936. Members of the Druze community demonstrate before Israeli forces by the barbed-wire fence separating the Israeli-an...

Federal Minister for Religious Affairs, Sardar Muhammad Yousaf, has revealed that nearly 40,000 Pakistani pilgrims who traveled to Iran, Iraq, and Syria are either missing or have overstayed, with no official record of their whereabouts.

United States President Donald Trump’s administration has revoked the foreign terrorist organisation designation for Al-Nusrah Front, also known as Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, according to a State Department memo filed on Monday, a major step as Washington moves to ease sanctions on Syria. The memo dated June 23 was signed by US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and was published in a preview of the Federal Register before official publication on Tuesday. The move comes a week after Trump signed an executive order terminating a US sanctions programme on Syria, to help end the country’s isolation from the international financial system and build on Washington’s pledge to help it rebuild after a devastating civil war. “In consultation with the attorney general and the secretary of the Treasury, I hereby revoke the designation of Al-Nusrah Front, also known as Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (and other aliases) as a Foreign Terrorist Organisation,” Rubio wrote in the memo. Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, was previously Al-Qaeda’s Syr...

Britain said on Saturday it was reestablishing diplomatic relations with Syria after the country’s years-long civil war, as foreign minister David Lammy visited its capital Damascus, pledging 94.5 million pounds ($129 million) in support. “There is renewed hope for the Syrian people,” Lammy said in a statement. “It is in our interests to support the […]

The United Kingdom is re-establishing full ties with Syria following the toppling of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad in December, foreign minister David Lammy said during a visit to Damascus on Saturday. “After over a decade of conflict, there is renewed hope for the Syrian people. The UK is re-establishing diplomatic relations because it is in our interests to support the new government to deliver their commitment to build a stable, more secure and prosperous future for all Syrians,” Lammy said in a statement. The statement came following Lammy’s meeting with Syria’s leader Ahmed al-Sharaa in Damascus, the Syrian presidency said, in his first visit since Assad’s ouster. Interim President Sharaa received Lammy alongside Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani, according to photos of the meeting released by the presidency. The talks addressed “bilateral ties … and ways of strengthening cooperation, as well as regional and international developments”, Sharaa’s office said in a statement. The Syrian foreign min...

Syria said on Friday it was willing to cooperate with the United States to reimplement the 1974 disengagement agreement with Israel, which created a UN-patrolled buffer zone separating the two countries’ forces. In a statement following a phone call with his US counterpart Marco Rubio, Asaad al-Shaibani expressed Syria’s “aspiration to cooperate with the United States to return to the 1974 disengagement agreement”. Washington has been pushing diplomatic efforts towards a normalisation deal between Syria and Israel, with envoy Thomas Barrack saying last week that peace between the two was now needed. Speaking to The New York Times, Barrack confirmed this week that Syria and Israel were engaging in “meaningful” US-brokered talks to end their border conflict. Following the toppling of longtime Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad in December, Israel deployed its troops into the UN-patrolled zone separating Syrian and Israeli forces. It has also launched hundreds of air strikes on military targets in Syria and carried ou...

President Donald Trump signed on Monday an executive order terminating a US sanctions programme on Syria, allowing an end to the country’s isolation from the international financial system and building on Washington’s pledge to help it rebuild after a devastating civil war. The move will allow the US to maintain sanctions on Syria’s ousted former president Bashar al-Assad, his associates, human rights abusers, drug traffickers, people linked to chemical weapons activities, the Islamic State and ISIS affiliates and proxies for Iran, White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt told reporters in a briefing. Assad was toppled in December in a lightning offensive by Islamist-led rebels and Syria has since taken steps to re-establish international ties. Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shibani said Trump’s termination of the Syria sanctions programme would “open door of long-awaited reconstruction and development,” according to a post by the foreign minister on social media platform X. He said the move would “lift the...

DAMASCUS: Syria’s interior ministry on Thursday said the Israeli military killed one civilian and detained seven people during an overnight incursion, with the Israeli army saying it seized members of Palestinian group Hamas. The Israeli army said on X that its soldiers seized several suspected members of Palestinian group Hamas in a “targeted” operation in Beit Jinn, 12 kilometres (seven and a half miles) from the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Since the overthrow of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad in December, Israel has carried out hundreds of strikes in Syria aimed at denying military assets to the Islamist-led interim administration. It has also deployed tro­ops across the demilitarised zone on the Syrian side of the armistice line that used to separate the opposing forces on the Golan. Syria’s interior ministry said “these repeated provocations constitute a blatant violation of the sovereignty of the Syrian Arab Republic… these practises cannot lead the region to stability and will only result in furthe...

Syria’s government has decreed that women should wear burkinis or other swimwear that covers the body at public beaches and swimming pools, while permitting Western-style beachwear at private clubs and luxury hotels. The tourism ministry decision issued this week marks the first time the Damascus authorities have issued guidelines related to what women can wear since Bashar al-Assad was toppled in December. During the Assad family’s iron-fisted rule of Syria, which was shaped by a secular Arab nationalist ideology, the state imposed no such restrictions, though people often dressed modestly at public beaches, reflecting conservative norms. The new requirements were set out in a wider decree dated June 9, which included public safety guidelines for beaches and swimming pools ahead of the summer, such as not spending too long in the sun and avoiding jellyfish. It said that beachgoers and visitors to public pools should wear “appropriate swimwear that respects public decency and the feelings of different segment...

ISLAMABAD - Pakistan yesterday welcomed the United States decision to lift sanctions from Syria, marking a pivotal step towards regional stability and economic recovery.

Pakistan has welcomed the United States’ decision to lift all sanctions on Syria, terming the move a “pivotal step towards regional stability”, according to a statement from the Foreign Office. US President Donald Trump, on his Gulf tour, met with Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa on Wednesday. Despite concerns within sectors of his administration over Syria’s leaders’ former ties to Al Qaeda, Trump said on Tuesday during a speech in Riyadh that he would lift sanctions on Syria in a major policy shift. “Pakistan has consistently advocated for constructive engagement and dialogue. The easing of sanctions is expected to facilitate economic growth, improve access to essential services, and support the rebuilding efforts of the Syrian authorities,” the FO statement read. Reaffirming Pakistan’s commitment towards Syria’s unity, sovereignty, and territorial integrity, the statement said, “Pakistan supports a Syrian-led and Syrian-owned resolution.” “We commend the commitment of all countries, in particular the US, T...