Syria de facto leader holds meeting with Christian clerics

“The leader of the new Syrian administration, Ahmed al-Sharaa, meets a delegation from the Christian community in Damascus,” Syria’s General Command said in a statement on Telegram.

The statement included pictures of the meeting with Catholic, Orthodox and Anglican clerics.

Since seizing power, Syria’s new leadership, headed by al-Sharaa, who was previously a member of al-Qaeda, has repeatedly tried to reassure minorities that they will not be harmed, although some isolated incidents have sparked protests.

On December 25, thousands protested in several areas of Syria after a video circulated showing an attack on an Alawite shrine in the country’s north.

A day earlier, hundreds of demonstrators took to the streets in Christian areas of Damascus to protest against the burning of a Christmas tree near Hama in central Syria.

Before the war erupted in 2011, Syria was home to about one million Christians, according to analyst Fabrice Balanche, who says their number has dwindled to about 300,000.

Earlier, a Syrian official told the AFP news agency that al-Sharaa held “positive” talks with delegates of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) on Monday.

The talks were al-Sharaa’s first with SDF commanders since his rebels overthrew longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad in early December and come as the SDF is locked in fighting with Turkish-backed factions in northern Syria.

The United States-backed SDF spearheaded the military campaign that pushed Daesh fighters from their last territory in Syria in 2019.

But Turkiye, which has long had ties with al-Sharaa’s Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group, says that the SDF is led by members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has waged a four-decade rebellion against the Turkish state, and is branded a “terrorist” group in Turkiye and the US.

On Sunday, al-Sharaa told Al Arabiya television that the SDF should be integrated into the new national army.

“Weapons must be in the hands of the state alone. Whoever is armed and qualified to join the defence ministry, we will welcome them,” he added.