President Bashar Al Assad has told a Kuwaiti newspaper that Syria has reached a "major understanding" with other Arab states after years of hostility over the country's civil war.
The interview in the Al Shahed newspaper, published Wednesday, was Al Assad's first with a Gulf newspaper since the war began in 2011.
He does not name the Arab countries, but says Arab and Western delegations have begun visiting Syria to prepare for the reopening of diplomatic and other missions.
The ostracised Assad regime and its backers in Moscow and Tehran have been calling for the international community to re-engage with Damascus, drop sanctions and re-establish links. Largely they are looking for Western assistance in rebuilding the shattered country after years of war – a task Iran and Russia do not have the financial capacity to do alone.
However, a reluctant EU and US say they are unwilling to offer money for rebuilding without meaningful political transition – in effect their call for Al Assad to step down from the presidency remains unchanged.
"Assad won the war, we have to state this. But he hasn't won the peace," France's Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said in early September.
Without this reform, it’s unlikely many states will reopen substantial diplomatic operations in Damascus.
In the Middle East, Al Assad’s relations are more contentious.
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Idlib deal a step forward but Syria quagmire far from resolved
September saw lowest civilian casualty of Syrian war
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Syria's membership in the 22-member Arab League was suspended in the early days of the war, and Arab countries later imposed economic sanctions.
Numerous states backed opposition groups fighting against the regime and concerns about Damascus’ cosy relationship with Tehran is of great concern, especially in the Gulf.
However, at last week’s United Nations General Assembly, Bahraini foreign minister Sheikh Khalid bin Ahmed bin Mohammed Al Khalifa met his Syrian counterpart Walid Muallem for the first time in years.
Pictures of the pair’s warm embrace hit social media and a few days later he went on Al Arabiya to explain the meeting.
"The meeting was unplanned and it wasn't the first time we meet since the outbreak of the Syrian war," Sheikh Khalid insisted.
The minister stressed that it comes "at a time where a serious Arab movement is aiming to reclaim the Arab role in the Syrian crisis.
“The Syrian government is the government of Syria, it is the rule in Syria. We work with states, even if we disagree with them and we don’t work with those that bring down those states," Sheikh Khalifa said.
Long before the UN meeting, UAE Minister of State for Gulf Affairs Anwar Gargash told The National in June that he regretted Syria's suspension from the Arab League as it had shut off a major conduit for regional voices in pushing for peace talks and a negotiated settlement to the conflict.
He said that Arab states had been left with the stalled UN talks in Geneva as their only seat at the table while Russia, Iran and now Turkey negotiated the future of Syria.
Dr Gargash said that given the state of affairs it wasn’t politically possible to readmit Syria to the Arab League.
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Name: HyperSpace
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From Zero
Artist: Linkin Park
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Number of tracks: 11
Rating: 4/5
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A timeline of the Historical Dictionary of the Arabic Language
- 2018: Formal work begins
- November 2021: First 17 volumes launched
- November 2022: Additional 19 volumes released
- October 2023: Another 31 volumes released
- November 2024: All 127 volumes completed
Day 5, Abu Dhabi Test: At a glance
Moment of the day When Dilruwan Perera dismissed Yasir Shah to end Pakistan’s limp resistance, the Sri Lankans charged around the field with the fevered delirium of a side not used to winning. Trouble was, they had not. The delivery was deemed a no ball. Sri Lanka had a nervy wait, but it was merely a stay of execution for the beleaguered hosts.
Stat of the day – 5 Pakistan have lost all 10 wickets on the fifth day of a Test five times since the start of 2016. It is an alarming departure for a side who had apparently erased regular collapses from their resume. “The only thing I can say, it’s not a mitigating excuse at all, but that’s a young batting line up, obviously trying to find their way,” said Mickey Arthur, Pakistan’s coach.
The verdict Test matches in the UAE are known for speeding up on the last two days, but this was extreme. The first two innings of this Test took 11 sessions to complete. The remaining two were done in less than four. The nature of Pakistan’s capitulation at the end showed just how difficult the transition is going to be in the post Misbah-ul-Haq era.
How Alia's experiment will help humans get to Mars
Alia’s winning experiment examined how genes might change under the stresses caused by being in space, such as cosmic radiation and microgravity.
Her samples were placed in a machine on board the International Space Station. called a miniPCR thermal cycler, which can copy DNA multiple times.
After the samples were examined on return to Earth, scientists were able to successfully detect changes caused by being in space in the way DNA transmits instructions through proteins and other molecules in living organisms.
Although Alia’s samples were taken from nematode worms, the results have much bigger long term applications, especially for human space flight and long term missions, such as to Mars.
It also means that the first DNA experiments using human genomes can now be carried out on the ISS.
Business Insights
- Canada and Mexico are significant energy suppliers to the US, providing the majority of oil and natural gas imports
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In numbers: China in Dubai
The number of Chinese people living in Dubai: An estimated 200,000
Number of Chinese people in International City: Almost 50,000
Daily visitors to Dragon Mart in 2018/19: 120,000
Daily visitors to Dragon Mart in 2010: 20,000
Percentage increase in visitors in eight years: 500 per cent
City's slump
L - Juventus, 2-0
D - C Palace, 2-2
W - N Forest, 3-0
L - Liverpool, 2-0
D - Feyenoord, 3-3
L - Tottenham, 4-0
L - Brighton, 2-1
L - Sporting, 4-1
L - Bournemouth, 2-1
L - Tottenham, 2-1
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