Saudi Arabia Appoints First Ambassador to Syria in More Than a Decade

Saudi Arabia’s state-run SPA media agency announced on Sunday that it is sending an ambassador to Damascus for the first time in more than a decade.  

Faisal Al-Mujfel will fill the ambassadorship, according to SPA. 

Syria reopened its embassy in Riyadh and appointed a new ambassador earlier this year.  

Saudi Arabia first cut diplomatic ties with Bashar Assad’s Syrian government in 2012, amid the regional chaos of the Arab Spring and the onset of the still ongoing Syrian civil war.  

Following the Assad regime’s violent crackdown on dissent, which included widespread extrajudicial killings and the use of chemical weapons on civilians, Saudi Arabia, along with the region’s other Western-aligned Arab states, cut all official diplomatic ties with the government, turning Damascus into a regional pariah.  

However, over the past year, Riyadh has quietly initiated a reproach, with Assad’s government having reopened its embassy in the Syrian capital earlier this year.  

Saudi Arabia’s announcement on Sunday marks the most significant step in diplomatic normalization between Syria and the rest of the Arab world to date, given the kingdom’s cultural significance as the home of Islam and role as a regional powerbroker.