After Diplomats Meet, Syria, Saudi Arabia Say Working To Resume Ties

Syria and Saudi Arabia are working toward renewing ties, the two countries announced on Thursday in a joint statement following a visit by Syria’s foreign minister to Jeddah on Wednesday, the first visit by a senior Syrian diplomat to Saudi Arabia in more than a decade.

Saudi Arabia cut ties with Damascus in 2012 in protest of Syrian President Bashar Assad’s brutal crackdown on the Arab Spring protests in 2011, and backed rebel groups that fought to remove Assad from power.  Syria also was kicked out of the Arab League. Saudi Arabia is hosting the next Arab League summit in May, and it is expected that the organization will consider restoring Syria to membership.

The statement said that Syria and Saudi Arabia are discussing reopening embassies and resuming flights between the two countries. It also said that the meeting focused on discussions toward reaching a “comprehensive political settlement of the Syrian crisis that would … achieve national reconciliation, and contribute to the return of Syria to the Arab fold.” It said that the talks also focused on how to assist “the Syrian state to extend its control over its territories to end the presence of armed militias and external interference in the Syrian internal affairs,” and on facilitating the delivery of humanitarian aid and the return of Syrian refugees.

Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad last week met with his counterparts from Egypt and Jordan, also for the first time in over a decade.