China has been urged to “play a greater role” in bringing peace to the Middle East, with more than 20 Arab diplomatic envoys meeting Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Beijing. “The situation in the Middle East has changed suddenly, and the people in the region are suffering. We expect China to play a greater…
An entire generation of Syrians has never known freedom and so when it swept over them, last Sunday, there was shock, then joy, and a desperate hope that it might last. Damascus is a city nearly 5,000 years old. But over this decade the war has seemed like the end of civilization. Half a million…
Hundreds of students at Damascus University trampled on a statue of one of Syria’s former rulers on Sunday, expressing jubilation as they returned to class a week after rebels ousted Bashar al-Assad. “The atmosphere is extraordinary. Everyone is happy — look at how joyful people are,” said medical student Rinad Abdallah, 18. In front of…
In the final, chaotic hours before rebel forces stormed Damascus and ended Bashar al-Assad‘s iron-fisted rule, the Syrian president had already fled the country. His departure, shrouded in secrecy, marked the abrupt collapse of his 24-year regime and his family’s 50-year hold over Syria. As the clock ticked towards Sunday morning, Assad had already abandoned…
Bashar al-Assad confided in almost no one about his plans to flee Syria as his reign collapsed. Instead, aides, officials and even relatives were deceived or kept in the dark, more than a dozen people with knowledge of the events told Reuters. A torn poster shows ousted Syrian President Bashar Assad at the entrance of…
new video loaded: Searching for Syria’s Disappeared transcript Back transcript Searching for Syria’s Disappeared Taher al-Zain’s father disappeared 12 years ago at the height of Bashar Al-Assad’s regime. Now, like thousands of other Syrians, he is trying to find clues about what happened, and whether or not he may still be alive. Taher al-Zain has…
On Dec. 10, longtime Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad fled to Moscow and abdicated his position as the country’s strongman after a whirlwind 12 days of regime collapse. He had inherited his autocracy, along with the banal instruments of repression and delusion used to control the country’s restive, multi-ethnic, multi-religious subjects, from his late father, Hafez…
It’s no surprise that President Joe Biden is largely unpopular among Republicans, but new polling data suggests his favorability is lower than that of some of the world’s most controversial figures, including the recently deposed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. According to a recent Economist/YouGov poll, conducted from December 8 to 10 with 1,593 U.S. adults,…
As China hosted the 19th Asian Games in September last year, President Xi Jinping welcomed Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad at a picturesque lakeside guesthouse in the eastern city of Hangzhou. By the time Xi and al-Assad emerged from their meeting, China and Syria had struck what they called a “strategic partnership.” A little over a…
Russia is withdrawing vessels from its naval base in Syria following the downfall of Bashar al-Assad, it has been reported, amid uncertainty over how Vladimir Putin can maintain his stepping stone in the Mediterranean Sea without a key ally in power. The march of the Syrian rebels led by the group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, which…