Russia Sponsors New Settlement in Syria’s West Daraa

Destruction in Syria's Daraa. Reuters file photo
Destruction in Syria's Daraa. Reuters file photo
TT

Russia Sponsors New Settlement in Syria’s West Daraa

Destruction in Syria's Daraa. Reuters file photo
Destruction in Syria's Daraa. Reuters file photo

Syrians living west of the southern Daraa province are patiently waiting for the implementation of a new Russian-sponsored settlement between the Syrian Army’s 4th Armored Division, led by Gen. Maher al-Assad, and the local central committee.

A UK-based war monitor, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, reported that an agreement was reached on Monday between regime officials and representatives of the Daraa security committee in the presence of a Russian forces delegate.

The agreement, according to the Observatory, allows regime forces and the 4th Armored Division to search homes and farms near Tafas city, which is located in the western countryside of Daraa, as of Tuesday morning.

Searches will be conducted in the presence of locals and elders of the area to ensure that no violations are carried out against civilians and their property.

Without setting a specific date, the deal also provided for the reopening of government buildings and regime institutions in Daraa city.

More so, regime forces released 58 detainees from their prisons.

Reliable sources in Daraa told the Observatory that the agreement reached under Russia’s sponsorship aimed at defusing mounting tensions in Tafas.

In Tafas, former opposition fighters and commanders were ordered to hand over heavy weapons they possess.

The two parties to the agreement decided that persons wanted by the regime should leave west Daraa to other places within the province’s borders. The relocation of these persons was guaranteed by their clans’ dignitaries.

According to the new deal, no one will be deported to north Syria, except only one commander called Abu Tareq Al-Subayhi.

Subayhi is a prominent commander from Ataman town in western Daraa, and he will be deported to north Syria alongside former fighters and commanders who expressed their desire to leave the southern province.

The agreement was brokered following a meeting attended by representatives of the Russian-backed 5th Corps, the central committee in Hawaran, and the regime-backed 4th Armored Division.



Putin Denies Russian Defeat in Syria, Says He Plans to Meet Assad

Russian President Vladimir Putin holds his annual end-of-year press conference in Moscow on December 19, 2024. (Photo by Alexander NEMENOV / AFP)
Russian President Vladimir Putin holds his annual end-of-year press conference in Moscow on December 19, 2024. (Photo by Alexander NEMENOV / AFP)
TT

Putin Denies Russian Defeat in Syria, Says He Plans to Meet Assad

Russian President Vladimir Putin holds his annual end-of-year press conference in Moscow on December 19, 2024. (Photo by Alexander NEMENOV / AFP)
Russian President Vladimir Putin holds his annual end-of-year press conference in Moscow on December 19, 2024. (Photo by Alexander NEMENOV / AFP)

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that Russia had not been defeated in Syria and that Moscow had made proposals to the new rulers in Damascus to maintain Russia's military bases there.
In his first public comments on the subject, Putin said he had not yet met former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad since was overthrown and forced to flee to Moscow earlier this month, but that he planned to do so.
In response to a question on the subject from a US journalist, Putin said he would ask Assad about the fate of US reporter Austin Tice, who is missing in Syria, and was ready to ask Syria's new rulers about Tice's whereabouts too.
"I will tell you frankly, I have not yet seen President Assad since he came to Moscow. But I plan to do so. I will definitely talk to him," said Putin.
He said most people in Syria with whom Russia had been in contact about the future of its two main military bases in Syria were supportive of them staying, but that talks were ongoing, Reuters said.
Russia, which intervened in Syria in 2015 and turned the tide of the civil war there in Assad's favor, had also told other countries that they could use its airbase and naval base to bring in humanitarian aid for Syria, he said.
"You want to portray everything that is happening in Syria as some kind of failure, a defeat for Russia. I assure you, it is not. And I'll tell you why. We came to Syria 10 years ago to prevent a terrorist enclave from being created there," said Putin.
"On the whole, we have achieved our goal. It is not for nothing that today many European countries and the United States want to establish relations with them (Syria's new rulers). If they are terrorist organizations, why are you (the West) going there? So that means they have changed."