Syria is gearing up for a critical national conference this week, bringing together representatives from its diverse social and political landscape to shape its future under the new rebel-led administration.
The conference's announcement followed statements by Syria's de facto leader, Ahmad Al Shara, who said elections in Syria could take up to four years, while drafting a new constitution may take three years.
Mohammad Khaled, a political affairs representative of the new administration led by Hayat Tahrir Al Sham (HTS), told The National that the national dialogue conference will be held in Damascus on January 4 and 5. It will include “more than 1,000 people participating from every Syrian province” across “the spectrum of Syrian society and its sects”, he said. More details will emerge with the formation of a preparatory committee within 24 hours, Mr Khaled added.
Local media reported that 1,200 Syrians would attend the event in their personal capacities rather than as representatives of any political entity. Additionally, 70 to 100 individuals from each governorate, representing all segments of society – including women and youth – will be invited to participate.
The conference could be the first pan-national gathering of Syria's various political and sectarian groups following 13 years of civil war. It will also serve as a critical test of whether the new regime can fulfil its promise to unite the country in the post-Assad era.
Mr Khaled said participants at the conference would discuss “a series of decisions related to the interim period of the next three to four years”, such as “establishing a constitutional committee, drafting a constitutional declaration and putting it up for popular referendum”.
HTS is made up mainly of groups from the extremist organisation Jabhat Al Nusra, which was linked to Al Qaeda. It broke those ties with Al Qaeda in 2016 and rebranded itself as Hayat Tahrir Al Sham, after a purge undertaken by the group's leader Mr Al Shara, formerly known by the nom de guerre Abu Mohammed Al Jawlani.
Local media said the preparatory committee for the conference should be announced soon. Invitations will be sent shortly, with a special effort made to include Syrian expatriates – politicians, civil society representatives, experts, and human rights activists – invited in their personal capacities.
The organisers expect the conference to take a series of decisions crucial to defining the future identity of Syria. Among these are the dissolution of the Baath Party and reconstitution of parliament, in addition to the reconstruction of all military and security formations.
Another expected outcome is forming a committee composed of experts to draft the country’s new constitution. This committee will “ensure that Syria's rich diversity is considered”. An advisory body could be established to support an interim president and assist the executive branch in fulfilling its duties.
The conference was announced along with a series of new appointments to the interim government, the latest being Maysaa Sabine to the role of central bank chief. Ms Sabine was formerly the deputy head of the bank under the previous regime of Bashar Al Assad and will be the first woman to head the institution in its more than 70-year history.
The UN and countries including the US have designated HTS as a terrorist organisation. Mr Al Shara previously participated in an Iraqi insurgency against the US as a member of a group that eventually became ISIS. He then led the Syrian branch of Al Qaeda in 2011, in the early years of the civil war. Despite this, western and regional officials have engaged with the new leadership, evaluating their plans and commitments.
Local media reported that a high-ranking Ukrainian delegation visited Damascus on Monday to meet Mr Al Shara. This follows President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's recent directive to his Foreign Ministry to establish contact with the new Syrian authorities.
Kuwait's Foreign Minister Abdullah Ali Al Yahya also visited Damascus on Monday along with Jassim Mohammed Al Badawi, Secretary General of the Gulf Co-operation Council, Kuwait's Foreign Ministry said. It follows a visit a day earlier by Azerbaijan's deputy foreign minister Yalchin Rafiyev, who met Assad Hassan Al Shibani, the Foreign Minister of Syria's transitional government. Mr Rafiyev offered his country’s support for Syria's rebuilding efforts.
The biog
Favourite food: Fish and seafood
Favourite hobby: Socialising with friends
Favourite quote: You only get out what you put in!
Favourite country to visit: Italy
Favourite film: Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels.
Family: We all have one!
Sholto Byrnes on Myanmar politics
Army of the Dead
Director: Zack Snyder
Stars: Dave Bautista, Ella Purnell, Omari Hardwick, Ana de la Reguera
Three stars
Wicked: For Good
Director: Jon M Chu
Starring: Ariana Grande, Cynthia Erivo, Jonathan Bailey, Jeff Goldblum, Michelle Yeoh, Ethan Slater
Rating: 4/5
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Attacks on Egypt’s long rooted Copts
Egypt’s Copts belong to one of the world’s oldest Christian communities, with Mark the Evangelist credited with founding their church around 300 AD. Orthodox Christians account for the overwhelming majority of Christians in Egypt, with the rest mainly made up of Greek Orthodox, Catholics and Anglicans.
The community accounts for some 10 per cent of Egypt’s 100 million people, with the largest concentrations of Christians found in Cairo, Alexandria and the provinces of Minya and Assiut south of Cairo.
Egypt’s Christians have had a somewhat turbulent history in the Muslim majority Arab nation, with the community occasionally suffering outright persecution but generally living in peace with their Muslim compatriots. But radical Muslims who have first emerged in the 1970s have whipped up anti-Christian sentiments, something that has, in turn, led to an upsurge in attacks against their places of worship, church-linked facilities as well as their businesses and homes.
More recently, ISIS has vowed to go after the Christians, claiming responsibility for a series of attacks against churches packed with worshippers starting December 2016.
The discrimination many Christians complain about and the shift towards religious conservatism by many Egyptian Muslims over the last 50 years have forced hundreds of thousands of Christians to migrate, starting new lives in growing communities in places as far afield as Australia, Canada and the United States.
Here is a look at major attacks against Egypt's Coptic Christians in recent years:
November 2: Masked gunmen riding pickup trucks opened fire on three buses carrying pilgrims to the remote desert monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor south of Cairo, killing 7 and wounding about 20. IS claimed responsibility for the attack.
May 26, 2017: Masked militants riding in three all-terrain cars open fire on a bus carrying pilgrims on their way to the Monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor, killing 29 and wounding 22. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack.
April 2017: Twin attacks by suicide bombers hit churches in the coastal city of Alexandria and the Nile Delta city of Tanta. At least 43 people are killed and scores of worshippers injured in the Palm Sunday attack, which narrowly missed a ceremony presided over by Pope Tawadros II, spiritual leader of Egypt Orthodox Copts, in Alexandria's St. Mark's Cathedral. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attacks.
February 2017: Hundreds of Egyptian Christians flee their homes in the northern part of the Sinai Peninsula, fearing attacks by ISIS. The group's North Sinai affiliate had killed at least seven Coptic Christians in the restive peninsula in less than a month.
December 2016: A bombing at a chapel adjacent to Egypt's main Coptic Christian cathedral in Cairo kills 30 people and wounds dozens during Sunday Mass in one of the deadliest attacks carried out against the religious minority in recent memory. ISIS claimed responsibility.
July 2016: Pope Tawadros II says that since 2013 there were 37 sectarian attacks on Christians in Egypt, nearly one incident a month. A Muslim mob stabs to death a 27-year-old Coptic Christian man, Fam Khalaf, in the central city of Minya over a personal feud.
May 2016: A Muslim mob ransacks and torches seven Christian homes in Minya after rumours spread that a Christian man had an affair with a Muslim woman. The elderly mother of the Christian man was stripped naked and dragged through a street by the mob.
New Year's Eve 2011: A bomb explodes in a Coptic Christian church in Alexandria as worshippers leave after a midnight mass, killing more than 20 people.
Other must-tries
Tomato and walnut salad
A lesson in simple, seasonal eating. Wedges of tomato, chunks of cucumber, thinly sliced red onion, coriander or parsley leaves, and perhaps some fresh dill are drizzled with a crushed walnut and garlic dressing. Do consider yourself warned: if you eat this salad in Georgia during the summer months, the tomatoes will be so ripe and flavourful that every tomato you eat from that day forth will taste lacklustre in comparison.
Badrijani nigvzit
A delicious vegetarian snack or starter. It consists of thinly sliced, fried then cooled aubergine smothered with a thick and creamy walnut sauce and folded or rolled. Take note, even though it seems like you should be able to pick these morsels up with your hands, they’re not as durable as they look. A knife and fork is the way to go.
Pkhali
This healthy little dish (a nice antidote to the khachapuri) is usually made with steamed then chopped cabbage, spinach, beetroot or green beans, combined with walnuts, garlic and herbs to make a vegetable pâté or paste. The mix is then often formed into rounds, chilled in the fridge and topped with pomegranate seeds before being served.
Bio
Born in Dibba, Sharjah in 1972.
He is the eldest among 11 brothers and sisters.
He was educated in Sharjah schools and is a graduate of UAE University in Al Ain.
He has written poetry for 30 years and has had work published in local newspapers.
He likes all kinds of adventure movies that relate to his work.
His dream is a safe and preserved environment for all humankind.
His favourite book is The Quran, and 'Maze of Innovation and Creativity', written by his brother.
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