Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani raised his country’s new flag on Friday at the United Nations, where he is attending a UN Security Council briefing, the first public appearance by a high-ranking Syrian government official in the United States since the fall of President Bashar al-Assad in a lightning opposition offensive in December.
The three-starred flag previously used by opposition groups has replaced the two-starred flag of the Assad era as the country's official emblem.
The new authorities in Damascus have been courting Washington in hopes of receiving relief from harsh sanctions that were imposed by the US and its allies in the wake of Assad’s brutal crackdown on peaceful anti-government protests in 2011 that spiraled into a civil war.
A delegation of Syrian officials traveled to the United States this week to attend World Bank and International Monetary Fund meetings in Washington and UN meetings in New York. It was unclear if Trump administration officials would meet with al-Shaibani during the visit.
“We are open to the international community and look forward to being treated the same way,” al-Shaibani said, as reported by state-run news agency SANA. “With the removal of the reason for the sanctions, they must be lifted.”
President Donald Trump's administration has yet to officially recognize the current Syrian government of Ahmad al-Sharaa, who led the offensive that toppled Assad. The Republican administration has also left the Assad-era sanctions in place, although it has provided temporary relief to some restrictions. The group that al-Sharaa led, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, remains a US-designated terrorist organization.
Two Republican members of the US Congress, Reps. Marlin Stutzman of Indiana and Cory Mills of Florida, arrived in Damascus last week on an unofficial visit organized by a Syrian-American nonprofit group and met with al-Sharaa and other government officials.
Mills told The Associated Press before meeting with al-Sharaa that “ultimately, it’s going to be the president’s decision” to lift sanctions or not, although he said that “Congress can advise.”
Mills later told Bloomberg News that he had discussed the US conditions for sanctions relief with al-Sharaa, including ensuring the destruction of chemical weapons left over from the Assad era, coordinating on counterterrorism, making a plan to deal with foreign militants who fought alongside the armed opposition to Assad, and providing assurances to Israel that Syria wouldn't pose a threat.
He also said that al-Sharaa had said that Syria could normalize relations with Israel “under the right conditions,” without specifying what those conditions are.
Other Western countries have warmed up to the new Syrian authorities more quickly. The UK government on Thursday lifted sanctions against a dozen Syrian entities, including government departments and media outlets, and the European Union has begun to roll back its sanctions.
