First international flight since Assad’s overthrow lands in Syria: NPR

DAMASCUS, Syria — The first international commercial flight since the fall of former Syrian President Bashar Assad landed at Damascus airport Tuesday.

The Qatar Airways flight landed at Damascus International Airport, greeted by relatives and friends of passengers inside a terminal.

Ashad al-Suleibi, head of the Syrian Air Transport Authority, said Qatar had provided assistance to rehabilitate the airport, which had suffered from years of neglect and suffered damage from periodic Israeli airstrikes.

“Honestly, the (Assad) regime has caused a lot of damage to this busy area, this busy airport as well as the Aleppo airport,” he said.

Many of the passengers were Syrian nationals arriving for the first time in more than a decade.

Osama Musalama, from the United States, said it was his first visit since before the civil war that broke out in 2011.

“I lost hope of returning to Syria,” he said. “We were waiting for this moment and lost hope, but thank God, now the country has its people back.”

Separately, Jordan’s official Petra news agency reported that a Royal Jordanian Airlines plane had left for Damascus for a test flight. The head of the Jordanian Civil Aviation Regulatory Commission, Captain Haitham Misto, who was on board the flight with a team of specialists, said the aim was to assess the technical condition of the airport from Damascus before resuming regular flights.

Since the rebels’ lightning offensive that toppled Assad a month ago, Arab and Western countries that had severed ties with the former government have reopened diplomatic ties with Syria’s new de facto authorities, led by the former government. Islamist insurgent group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS.

The new Syrian Foreign Minister, Asaad al-Shibani, visited Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates in recent days. Gulf countries will likely play a key role in financing Syria’s reconstruction after nearly 14 years of civil war that preceded Assad’s overthrow.

On Tuesday, al-Shibani traveled to Jordan to meet his counterpart in Amman. Jordan’s Foreign Ministry said the officials were ready to discuss “cooperation mechanisms in many areas, including borders, security, energy, transport, water, trade and other sectors vital.”

Under Assad’s rule, Jordan was one of the main conduits for smuggling highly addictive Captagon amphetamines produced in Syria into the Gulf states, posing a point of tension between the two countries.

Syria’s new authorities have pretended to crack down on the Captagon trade, dismantling old factories in places such as the Mazzeh air base in Damascus, an auto trading company in Latakia and a factory that once made potato chips in the suburb of Damascus, Douma.

“The new situation in Syria has also put an end to the threats that previously threatened the security of the Kingdom (of Jordan), regarding drugs and Captagon, and we promise that this matter has ended and will not return again,” he said. al-Shibani said. during a joint press conference with Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman al-Safadi.

Al-Safadi said his country supports the Syrian people in their efforts to “rebuild their homeland on the foundations that preserve its security, stability, sovereignty and unity and respect the rights of its people,” adding that Jordan is “ready to supply electricity”. immediately to our brothers, and we are also ready to work together to supply gas. »

Syria, targeted by strict Western sanctions, is plunged into a prolonged economic crisis and Syrians receive only a few hours of state-provided electricity per day.