Syria’s new chief Ahmed al-Sharaa instructed Lebanese Druze leaders on Sunday that his nation wouldn’t negatively intrude in Lebanon and would respect its neighbour’s sovereignty.
Syria will not exert “damaging interference in Lebanon in any respect – it respects Lebanon’s sovereignty, the unity of its territories, the independence of its selections and its safety stability,” Sharaa instructed visiting Druze chiefs Walid and Taymur Jumblatt.
Walid Jumblatt is the primary Lebanese determine to fulfill Sharaa since his group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and allied insurgent factions launched a lightning offensive final month, seizing Damascus on December 8 and ousting longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad.
Syria “will keep at equal distance from all” in Lebanon, Sharaa added, acknowledging that Syria has been a “supply of worry and nervousness” for the nation.
Walid Jumblatt, lengthy a fierce critic of Assad and his father Hafez who dominated Syria earlier than him, arrived in Damascus Sunday on the head of a delegation of lawmakers from his parliamentary bloc and non secular figures from Lebanon’s Druze minority.
Syria’s new rulers identify overseas minister amid push for worldwide relations
He met with Sharaa – till not too long ago recognized extra broadly by his nom de guerre Abu Mohammed al-Jolani – on the presidential palace, the place the brand new Syrian chief was carrying a swimsuit and tie.
HTS has been proscribed as a terrorist organisation by many Western governments, together with america, although it has not too long ago sought to reasonable its rhetoric and vowed to guard Syria’s spiritual and ethnic minorities.
Walid Jumblatt accuses the Syrian authorities of getting assassinated his father in 1977 throughout Lebanon’s civil warfare.
Quite a few different assassinations have been blamed on the Assad household’s authorities over the a long time.
The Syrian military entered Lebanon in 1976 as a part of an Arab power that was supposed to place an finish to the nation’s civil warfare, which started a yr earlier.
However as an alternative it turned the dominant navy and political power, looming over all features of Lebanese life.
Syrian forces solely stop Lebanon in 2005 after huge strain following the assassination of former prime minister Rafic Hariri, a killing attributed to Damascus and its ally Hezbollah.