Why Türkiye is So Influential in Post-Assad Syria

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, left, sits with Ahmad Al-Sharaa during their meeting in Damascus, Syria, Sunday, Dec. 22, 2024. (AP file photo)
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, left, sits with Ahmad Al-Sharaa during their meeting in Damascus, Syria, Sunday, Dec. 22, 2024. (AP file photo)
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Why Türkiye is So Influential in Post-Assad Syria

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, left, sits with Ahmad Al-Sharaa during their meeting in Damascus, Syria, Sunday, Dec. 22, 2024. (AP file photo)
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, left, sits with Ahmad Al-Sharaa during their meeting in Damascus, Syria, Sunday, Dec. 22, 2024. (AP file photo)

Türkiye has emerged as one of the most influential power brokers in Syria after the opposition factions toppled Bashar al-Assad last month, ending his family's brutal five-decade rule.
NATO member Türkiye is now in a position to influence its neighbor's future diplomatically, economically and militarily.
Here are details of Türkiye's connections with Syria and how it hopes to use its influence there.
WHY IS TURKIYE IMPORTANT?
Türkiye, which shares a 911 km (566-mile) border with Syria, was the main backer of the opposition groups fighting under the banner of the Syrian National Army during the 13-year uprising against Assad. It cut diplomatic ties with Damascus in 2012.
It is the biggest host of Syrians who fled the civil war, taking in some 3 million people, and is the main entry-point for aid.
Since 2016, Türkiye, with its Syrian allies, has mounted several cross-border military campaigns against Kurdish militants based in Syria's northeast that it sees as a threat to its national security.
Syria's new administration, led by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) is friendly towards Ankara.
WHAT DOES TURKIYE WANT?
With its strong ties to Syria's new leadership, Türkiye stands to benefit from intensified trade and cooperation in areas including reconstruction, energy and defense.
Assad's fall has presented Ankara with a window of opportunity to try to end the presence of the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) along its borders.
Ankara views the YPG as an extension of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has been waging an insurgency against the Turkish state since 1984 and is deemed a terrorist group by Türkiye, the United States and the European Union.
The YPG militia spearheads the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) alliance, which is the United States' main local partner in the fight against Islamic State and controls swathes of territory in the northeast.
Washington's longtime support of the Kurdish factions has been a source of tension with Ankara, but Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan has said he believes incoming US president Donald Trump will take a different approach.
Trump has not said publicly what his plans might be but has said that he thinks "Türkiye is going to hold the key to Syria."
Syria's de facto leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa, who heads HTS, has said he does not want Syria becoming a platform for the PKK to launch attacks against Türkiye.
As the opposition factions led by Sharaa took control of Damascus last month, fighting flared between Turkish-backed and Kurdish-led forces in the northeast.
The SDF has shown flexibility regarding some of Türkiye’s demands, telling Reuters last month that its foreign fighters, including PKK members, would leave Syria if Ankara agrees to a ceasefire.
Intensive talks are underway to try to resolve the conflict in the region.
WHAT HAS TURKIYE SAID AND DONE?
Türkiye’s intelligence chief, Ibrahim Kalin, was in Damascus days after Assad was ousted, and its top diplomat, Fidan, was the first foreign minister to visit. Türkiye was also the first nation to reopen its embassy.
Fidan has said that Türkiye is proud to have been "on the right side of history" in Syria but has no desire to "dominate" it.
Türkiye has promised to support Syria's reconstruction, offering to help rebuild infrastructure, draft a new constitution, supply electricity and resume flights.
It hopes Syrians it is hosting will start returning home but has said it will not force them to leave.
Türkiye has also called repeatedly for the YPG to be disbanded, while warning of a new military offensive if authorities in Damascus do not address the issue. Its officials have met repeatedly with US and Syrian counterparts about the issue.
The SDF has said it would be willing to integrate with Syria's defense ministry, but only as "a military bloc".



Sudan Families Bury Loved Ones Twice as War Reshapes Khartoum

A Red Crescent team exhumes bodies from a mass grave in Khartoum. (Asharq Al-Awsat)
A Red Crescent team exhumes bodies from a mass grave in Khartoum. (Asharq Al-Awsat)
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Sudan Families Bury Loved Ones Twice as War Reshapes Khartoum

A Red Crescent team exhumes bodies from a mass grave in Khartoum. (Asharq Al-Awsat)
A Red Crescent team exhumes bodies from a mass grave in Khartoum. (Asharq Al-Awsat)

Under a punishing mid‑morning sun, Souad Abdallah cradles her infant and stares at a freshly opened pit in al‑Baraka square on the eastern fringe of Sudan’s capital.

Moments earlier the hole had served as the hurried grave of her husband – one of hundreds of people buried in playgrounds, traffic islands and vacant lots during Sudan’s two‑year war.

Seven months ago, Abdallah could not risk the sniper fire and checkpoints that ringed Khartoum’s official cemeteries. Today she is handed her husband’s remains in a numbered white body‑bag so he can receive the dignity of a proper burial.

She is not alone. Families gather at the square, pointing out makeshift graves – “my brother lies here... my mother there” – before forensic teams lift 118 bodies and load them onto flat‑bed trucks known locally as dafaar.

The Sudanese war erupted on 15 April 2023 when the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and the army clashed for control of Khartoum, quickly spreading to its suburbs, notably Omdurman. More than 500 civilians died in the first days and thousands more have been killed since, although no official tally exists.

The army recaptured the capital on 20 May 2025, but the harder task, officials say, is re‑burying thousands of bodies scattered in mass graves, streets and public squares.

“For the next 40 days we expect to move about 7,000 bodies from across Khartoum to public cemeteries,” Dr. Hisham Zein al‑Abideen, the city’s chief forensic pathologist, told Asharq Al-Awsat. He said his teams, working with the Sudanese Red Crescent, have already exhumed and re-interred some 3,500 bodies and located more than 40 mass graves.

One newly discovered site at the International University of Africa in southern Khartoum contains about 7,000 RSF fighters spread over a square‑kilometer area, he added.

Abdallah, a mother of three, recalled to Asharq Al-Awsat how a stray bullet pierced her bedroom window and killed her husband. “We buried him at night, without witnesses and without a wake,” she said. “Today I am saying goodbye again this time with honor.”

Nearby, Khadija Zakaria wept as workers unearthed her sister. “She died of natural causes, but we were barred from the cemetery, so we buried her here,” she said. Her niece and brother‑in‑law were laid in other improvised graves and are also awaiting transfer.

Exhumations can be grim. After finishing at al‑Baraka, the team drives to al‑Fayhaa district, where the returning owner of an abandoned house has reported a desiccated corpse in his living room. Neighbors said it is a Rapid Support Forces (RSF) fighter shot by comrades. In another case, a body is pulled from an irrigation canal and taken straight to a cemetery.

Social media rumors that authorities demand hefty fees for re‑burials are untrue, Dr. Zein al‑Abideen stressed. “Transporting the remains is free. It is completely our responsibility,” he added. The forensic crews rotate in two shifts to cope with the fierce heat.

Asked how they cope with the daily horror, one member smiled wanly over a cup of tea, saying: “We are human. We try to find solutions amid the tragedy. If it were up to us, no family would have to mourn twice.”

Khartoum today is burying bodies – and memories. “We are laying our dead to rest and, with them, part of the pain,” Abdallah said as she left the square, her child asleep on her shoulder. “I buried my husband twice, but we have not forgotten him for a single day. Perhaps now he can finally rest in peace.”