The leader of the Syrian regime, Ahmed Saleh, visited Russia on October 15 to meet with Russian President Putin.This is the first visit to Russia since Saleh took over the Syrian regime last December and has received foreign attention.
What consensus was reached?
The Russian President's website said on the 15th that Putin held talks in the Kremlin that day with Shara, who was on a working visit to Russia. The topics of the talks included cooperation in the political, economic, trade, cultural and cultural fields between the two countries, as well as the situation in the Middle East. Putin said that Russia and Syria have always maintained friendly relations. Russia has never linked its relations with Syria to the political situation or specific interests. Russia has always attached great importance to the interests of the Syria people in its relations with Syria.
Shala thanked Russia for its assistance in various fields, saying that Syria and Russia have long-standing historical ties, and that Syria has achieved many achievements with Russian help. Syria is willing to continue to cooperate with Russia. He said that Syria respects the history of the two countries and all previous agreements, and is “struggling to restore and redefine” the essence of the relationship in a new way to ensure Syrian sovereignty, territorial integrity and security stability.
Russian Deputy Prime Minister Novak said after the talks that Russia intends to cooperate with Syria to develop energy."Russian companies have been exploiting Syria oil fields for a long time." In addition, Russia is also willing to help Syria rebuild railways and restore other key infrastructure.
People familiar with the matter said that Syria hopes that Russia will provide some economic preferential treatment, such as resuming preferential policies for grain exports to Syria. Syria also hopes to win Russian support in opposing Israeli invasion. Israel seeks to achieve "complete demilitarization" in the three provinces of Suweida, Daraa and Quneitra in southern Syria, which is strongly opposed by Syria.
A Syrian foreign ministry official said that “economic and political issues, as well as the position of Russia in Syrian military bases, are on the agenda.”
What is the fate of the military base?
Russia has previously supported the Bashar al-Assad government.Russia currently has two major military bases in Syria – the Tartus naval base in western Syria and the Hemeim air base, as well as a military presence in the Kamishli region near the northeastern border between Turkey and Iraq.
The survival of the two military bases has always been the focus of contact between the two sides. Putin and Shara did not mention these two military bases in their public speeches on the 15th. Russia previously stated that it is in contact with the Syrian leadership on this matter, and that relevant matters have not yet been decided and will be "decided during the dialogue process."
According to Russian media reports on the 16th, Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov confirmed on the same day that Putin and Sarah discussed the issue of Russia's military base in Syria during the talks.
Reuters, citing a Syrian source, said Syria was seeking assurances from Russia that it would not help rearm “the remaining forces of Bashar Assad” and help rebuild “the Syrian army.”
Reuters earlier that Israel lobbied that the United States agreed to maintain Syria’s weakness and division, allowing Russia to retain military bases in Syria to counter Turkey’s growing influence.
Talk about Bashar?
The media previously quoted people familiar with the matter as saying that Shara would ask Putin to extradite former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who was in exile in Moscow. According to Russian media reports, the two men did not mention Bashar's name in their public speeches that day. It is not known whether the two-and-a-half-hour closed-door interview involved this matter.
After the former Syrian regime led by Bashar was overthrown in December last year, he fled to Russia with his family and has never made a public appearance since then. Recently, some media rumored that he was "poisoned" in Moscow and sent to hospital for emergency treatment. There are also media claims that Bashar lives in seclusion in a luxury apartment in Moscow and is "addicted to video games for a long time". None of these rumors have been confirmed.
Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov let out a leak earlier this week, confirming that Bashar still lives in Moscow. Lavrov said that Russia granted asylum to Bashar and his family "entirely for humanitarian reasons,""he has no problem staying in Moscow," and "there has never been any poisoning incident."
Two Syrian officials who did not want to disclose their names had previously told Reuters that Sarai would take the opportunity of this visit to Russia to formally seek to extradite Bashar to his country for trial. Sarai said in a news program broadcast by Columbia Radio on December 12, that the Syrian regime would "use all available legal means" to demand that Bashar be "raised to justice" (reporter: Wang Wang Bin, Dong Alai, Sun Mu, Lu Zhao, Zhao Ice; video: Sun Mu).