EU to ‘step up direct engagement’ with Syria leaders

ANKARA - European Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen pledged to intensify the EU’s “direct engagement” with Syria’s new Islamist-led rulers after the overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad.

Her remarks came after the European Union agreed to reopen its mission in Damascus and ramp up support for Syria, even as it laid out a raft of conditions that the new leaders must respect.

Speaking after talks in Ankara with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose government is in constant dialogue with Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), Dr Von der Leyen said the EU would increase contact with the rebel group that

ousted Mr Assad.

“Now we have to step up and continue our direct engagement with HTS and other factions,” she said.

European countries are wrestling with their approach to HTS, which is rooted in the Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda and has largely been seen in the West as a terror group, despite moderating its rhetoric.

Earlier this week, the EU sent a senior diplomat to Syria to directly engage with the interim government, and as a result of “constructive” talks, Brussels would reopen its mission there, foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said on Dec 17.

Turkey had already

reopened its Damascus embassy

on Dec 14.

Amid a surge of hope for Syria’s future following Mr Assad’s demise, Dr Von der Leyen warned it was essential to prevent any resurgence of Islamic State group extremists, whose self-declared caliphate was defeated in Syria in 2019.

“The risk of a Daesh resurgence... is real. We cannot let this happen,” she said, using an Arabic acronym for Islamic State.

Speaking alongside her, Mr Erdogan vowed he would not let the region become “a hotbed of terrorism”, saying Turkey would fight both Islamic State and other terror groups in the region, in a reference to armed Kurdish groups Ankara sees as a major security threat.

“There is no place for neither Daesh nor PKK and its affiliates in the future of our region,” he said.

$1 billion in refugee funding

Since 2016, Turkey has launched a string of military operations in northern Syria, mainly targeting Kurdish group YPG, which is a key part of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces.

Ankara sees the YPG as an extension of the PKK, its domestic nemesis which has fought a decades-long insurgency on Turkish soil.

Dr Von der Leyen agreed on Dec 17 that “Turkey’s legitimate concerns must be addressed”.

She also said the EU would give Turkey an extra €1 billion (S$1.4 billion) to help it with the three million or so Syrian refugees it is hosting who fled there when the civil war began in 2011.

“An additional €1 billion for 2024 is on its way,” she said, indicating that the funds would “contribute to migration and border management, including voluntary returns of Syrian refugees”.

Ankara is hoping the shift in power in Damascus will allow many of them to return home. AFP