Washington is scrapping a long-standing reward for the arrest of Syria’s new leader, a senior US diplomat said on Friday following “positive messages” from a first meeting that included a promise to fight terrorism.
Barbara Leaf, Washington’s top diplomat for the Middle East, made the comments after her meeting with Ahmed al-Sharaa in Damascus — the first formal mission to Syria’s capital by US diplomats since the early days of Syria’s civil war.
The lightning offensive that toppled former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad on Dec. 8 was led by the Muslim Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which is rooted in al-Qaeda’s Syria branch, but has sought to moderate its image in recent years.
Photo: Reuters
Leaf’s meeting with HTS chief al-Sharaa came despite Washington’s six-year-old designation of his group as a terrorist organization.
“Based on our discussion, I told him we would not be pursuing the Rewards for Justice reward offer,” Leaf told reporters.
After their talks, “it’s a little incoherent, then, to have a bounty on the guy’s head,” she said, welcoming the messages from him.
“We will be looking for progress on these principles and actions, not just words,” she said.
After the meeting, a statement from Syria’s new leaders said they wanted to contribute to regional peace.
“The Syrian people stand at an equal distance from all countries and parties in the region... Syria rejects any polarization,” the statement said.
Leaf said she told al-Sharaa of the “critical need to ensure terrorist groups cannot pose a threat inside of Syria or externally, including to the US and our partners in the region.”
“Ahmed al-Sharaa committed to this,” she said.
The US delegation also included Roger Carstens, the US point man on hostages. He said he worked on Friday with the new Syrian leadership to search a location where US journalist Austin Tice could have been held, and “we’ll be working with the interim authorities” to examine other locations.
Tice was kidnapped in Syria in August 2012.
On a regional tour prior to the Aqaba talks, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken had stressed the need to prevent a resurgence of Islamic State (IS) group militants.
The US military on Friday said its forces had killed an IS leader and another operative in Deir Ezzor province, part of escalated US military action against the group since al-Assad’s overthrow.
The US embassy said Leaf also met with Syria’s White Helmet rescuers, civil society leaders, activists and others “to hear directly from them about their vision for the future of their country.”
Below a photograph of Leaf and others with a memorial wreath, the embassy said she had also commemorated the tens of thousands of people murdered, tortured, disappeared or detained under al-Assad.
“The US commitment to hold accountable those responsible for these atrocities is unwavering,” the embassy said on X.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who backed al-Assad’s opponents, has stressed reconciliation and restoration of Syria’s territorial integrity and unity.
Turkey has been putting pressure on Kurdish-led forces in Syria, and Erdogan on Friday said it was time to destroy “terrorist” groups operating in the country, specifically IS and Kurdish fighters.
“DAESH [IS], the PKK [the Kurdistan Workers’ Party] and their affiliates — which threaten the survival of Syria — must be eradicated,” he told journalists following a summit in Cairo.
The autonomous administration in northeastern Syria is protected by the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), mostly made up of the People’s Protection Units (YPG).
Turkey accuses the YPG of being a branch of the PKK, which Washington and Ankara consider a terrorist group.
Kurdish leaders in Syria have welcomed al-Assad’s ouster and raised the three-star independence-era rebel flag, but many in the region fear continued attacks by Turkey and allied fighters.
Washington was urging a ceasefire between Turkish-backed forces and the SDF around the Kurdish-held Syrian border town of Kobane, also known as Ain al-Arab, Leaf said.
On a visit to Ankara on Friday, German Minister of Foreign Affairs Annalena Baerbock warned of the dangers of any “escalation” of the fighting, saying that “security, especially for Kurds, is essential for a free and secure future for Syria.”
Iran and Russia had long helped to prop up al-Assad, but on Friday Leaf said she expected Syria would completely end any role for Iran.
South Korea’s air force yesterday apologized for a 2021 midair collision involving two fighter jets, a day after auditors said the pilots were taking selfies and filming during the flight and held them responsible for the accident. “We sincerely apologize to the public for the concern caused by the accident that occurred in 2021,” an air force spokesman told a news conference, adding that one of the pilots involved had been suspended from flying duties, received severe disciplinary action and has since left the military. The apology followed a report released on Wednesday by the South Korean Board of Audit and Inspection,
Young Chinese, many who fear age discrimination in their workplace after turning 35, are increasingly starting “one-person companies” that have artificial intelligence (AI) do most of the work. Smaller start-ups are already in vogue in Silicon Valley and elsewhere, with rapidly advancing AI tools seen as a welcome teammate even as they threaten layoffs at existing firms. More young people in China are subscribing to the model, as cities pledge millions of dollars in funding and rent subsidies for such ventures, in alignment with Beijing’s political goal of “technological self-reliance.” “The one-person company is a product of the AI era,” said Karen Dai
About 240 Indians claiming descent from a Biblical tribe landed at Tel Aviv airport on Thursday as part of a government operation to relocate them to Israel. The newcomers passed under a balloon arch in blue and white, the colors of the Israeli flag, as dozens of well-wishers welcomed them with a traditional Jewish song. They were the first “bnei Menashe” (“sons of Manasseh”) to arrive in Israel since the government in November last year announced funding for the immigration of about 6,000 members of the community from the states of Manipur and Mizoram in northeast India. The community claims to descend from
‘TROUBLING’: The firing of Phelan, who was an adviser to a nonprofit that supported the defense of Taiwan, was another example of ‘dysfunction’ under Trump, a US senator said US Secretary of the Navy John Phelan has been fired, a US official and a person familiar with the matter said on Wednesday, in another wartime shakeup at the Pentagon coming just weeks after US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth ousted the Army’s top general. The Pentagon announced his departure in a brief statement, saying he was leaving the administration “effective immediately,” but it did not provide a reason or say whether it was his decision to go. The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Phelan was dismissed in part because he was moving too slowly to implement reforms to
RSS