The Assad regime had caused the world’s largest refugee crisis by forcing more than 14 million people to flee the country in fear of being detained, killed or forcibly disappeared.
Qatar has stressed on the need to prioritise addressing Syria’s humanitarian situation while calling for the lifting of international sanctions on the country after the fall of the Bashar Al-Assad regime.
“It’s necessary to lift the sanctions quickly, given that what led to these sanctions is no longer there and that what led to these sanctions were the crimes of the former regime,” Majed Al-Ansari, Qatar’s Foreign Ministry Spokesperson, told a weekly press briefing in Doha on Tuesday.
Al-Ansari’s remarks came following the visit of a high-profile Qatari delegation to Damascus on Monday, led by the Minister of State at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Mohammed Al-Khulaifi, who met Syria’s de facto ruler, Ahmed Al-Sharaa.
The high-level visit came days after the fall of the Assad regime on December 8 in a surprise offensive led by Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS).
The Qatari delegation had travelled aboard the first Qatar Airways flight to Damascus International Airport in 13 years since the Gulf state severed ties with the Assad regime in response to its brutal crackdown on peaceful protesters.
Qatar had closed its embassy in 2011 and was the first to establish the diplomatic mission for the opposition in its capital, Doha, while maintaining its unwavering stance against the Assad regime.
Syria has been facing strict international sanctions, including the ones by the the United States and European Union, in response to Assad’s brutality that dragged the country to a civil war.
A Qatari official had told Doha News on Monday that a technical aviation team from the Gulf state accompanied the delegation that visited Syria to assess the readiness of Damascus Airport for the resumption of its operations.
Speaking at the press briefing, Al-Ansari explained that the team “discussed how Qatar can perform a positive role” in ensuring the resumption of the airport’s operations.
“The symbolic message associated with the landing of the Qatar Airways plane in Damascus International Airport reflects the State of Qatar’s commitment to taking all essential measures to ensure the airport’s recommissioning and resuming flights to the sisterly Syrian Arab Republic,” Al-Ansari said.
Meanwhile, Qatar launched a humanitarian air bridge on December 12 to provide Syrians with crucial humanitarian assistance, with deliveries carried out through the Turkish city of Gaziantep, Jordan’s Marka military airport and Lebanon’s Rafic Hariri International Airport.
“The priority is for urgent humanitarian needs to ensure a successful and unhindered transition process, especially on the humanitarian side,” Al-Ansari noted.
The Assad regime had caused the world’s largest refugee crisis by forcing more than 14 million people to flee the country in fear of being detained, killed or forcibly disappeared.
According to the Syrian Network for Human Rights (SNHR), the regime detained at least 157,287 people between March 2011 and June 2024, of which at least 112,713 were forcibly disappeared, including 1,305 children and 6,698 women.
In June 2023, Qatar was among 83 members who voted in favour of a United Nations General Assembly resolution to create an independent body to investigate the fate of thousands of people who remain missing in Syria.
