The opportunity to bring Syria out of decades of isolation “must not be lost”, the country’s Foreign Minister warned during his first state visit to the UK.
Asaad Al Shibani met UK Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper on Thursday after raising the new Syrian flag at the formerly abandoned embassy building in London.
Mr Al Shibani said the new government will work “round the clock” to “introduce to the world the importance of Syria”, after it became politically and economically isolated under the regime of former president Bashar Al Assad.
“There are very important files in Britain and we seek to seize this historic opportunity to strengthen relations. Syria is no longer a marginal state but one that matters to all nations,” he said at an event at the Chatham House think tank after his meeting with Ms Cooper.
He described the UK’s relations with Syria as a “deep friendship” that goes back to the UK’s humanitarian and political support for the opposition during the civil war.
Mr Al Shibani also praised the UK lifting sanctions on Syria this year, which paved the way for similar reversals in the EU and US.
“Our relationships with the UK are advanced. We are not talking about opening a new page, we are talking about deepening these relationships because they are strong ones,” he said.
“It represents a friendship that is deep on the humanitarian level, on the economic level in the coming days. There are files that are very important for the Syrians and the British.”
Mr Al Shibani rejected suggestions that the UK was still “cautious” about its relations with the new government: “We have not seen this personally."
He also met business leaders in the UK to mark the launch of the Syrian British Business Council, which hopes to attract foreign direct investments to the country.
Syrians gather outside abandoned embassy
Hundred of Syrians in London gathered outside their long-abandoned embassy to see it reopen for the first time in 13 years, cheering as Mr Al Shibani raised the country's new flag from the balcony.
The embassy shut in 2012 after the UK severed diplomatic ties with the former Assad regime over its attacks on civilians who rose up against it and the killing of American journalist Marie Colvin, who worked for British media.
Mr Al Shibani praised that decision. “We thank the British government then because it was a decision made for moral purposes,” he told the Chatham House event.
His speech on Thursday morning was drowned out by the cheers of people chanting “God, Syria, freedom and nothing else". A group of women called out support for Abu Mohamed, a nickname for Syrian President Ahmad Al Shara, who has not yet visited the UK.
Mr Al Assad's attempts to crush peaceful protests in 2011 led to the civil war, which killed 600,000 people and forced more than half of the population to flee Syria. By far most of the casualties were civilians killed by his forces and their allies.
“For almost 14 years this embassy has been closed, and for the right reasons, because the UK decided to cut off all diplomatic relations with the Assad regime – a genocidal regime which was torturing its people and killing its people,” said Razan Saffour, an adviser to the Syrian Foreign Ministry and a British Syrian.
Relations were restored in July this year, months after Mr Al Assad fled to Russia and a transitional government was established.
“On December 8 last year, Syrians were liberated and since then the new government has been working on diplomatic relations with the entire world,” Ms Saffour told The National.
Mr Al Shibani was paying his first official visit to the UK and was joined at the embassy by the UK’s Syria envoy, Ann Snow. He raised the flag at the old embassy in Washington earlier this week, during Mr Al Shara's first visit to the White House.
The reopening is hugely symbolic for Syrians in London, many of whom moved to the UK as refugees and lost family members and their homes during the war in Syria.
“We are gaining back our freedom, our dignity. We are raising the flag of the Syrian revolution. We can be proud of our own flag and our own country again,” said Maya, a business manager in London.
She told The National she could not have imagined such a moment just a year ago. “At some point I lost hope because it seemed like the entire world was trying to reintroduce Assad,” she said. “In just a few days Assad collapsed. We had Syria back. It changed our lives forever.”
But there are also practical considerations. Syrians and British dual nationals need the embassy for consular services and to have official documents certified. Ms Saffour said an ambassador would be appointed soon and that the embassy will start providing services to Syrians in the UK by 2026.
“It marks a new chapter in Syrian and UK diplomatic relations, and more importantly it means that Syrians here finally have support,” she said. “They didn't have support here. There was no one to stand by them.”
