Trump to lift sanctions on Syria and meet a new president

President Trump said on Tuesday that he would raise the US sanctions on Syria, throw an economic lifeline of a country destroyed by nearly 14 years of civil war and contracts from dictatorship in the Assad family.

Mr. Trump was expected to meet for the first time with the new Syrian president, Ahmed Al -Sharra, on Wednesday in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, where the American leader is making the first major government visit for his second term. Mr. Al -Sharra led the rebel alliance that toppled President Bashar al -Assad in Syria in December.

The US President issued a sudden declaration to end the sanctions, as he addressed a business forum in the Saudi capital, his leadership, where the crowd erupted in chants and gave him an existing applause.

The decision is to change the sea for Syria, and to break economic strangulation in a country that is seen as it is very important for the stability of the Middle East.

“There is a new government,” said Mr. Trump. “This is what we want to see in Syria.”

Throughout Syria, people were poured into the streets of the major cities to ventilate the news that they hope to reduce the overwhelming poverty faced by the majority of the population.

The Minister of Foreign Affairs in Syria, Asad Hassan Al -Shaybani, praised this step as a “new beginning on the way for reconstruction” and praised the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia as “the voice of reason and wisdom” in the region. The United States did not mention directly.

Since the overthrow of Mr. Assad, critics and supporters of the new Syrian leadership argued that the fall of the regime should put an end to the sanctions, many of which were put in response to a brutal repression on several aspects.

“The sanctions were implemented in response to the crimes committed by the previous regime against the people,” Mr. Al -Sharra told the New York Times in interview last month.

Mr. Trump said that he reached the decision after speaking with the President of Türkiye, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who supported the anti -Assad rebellion, Saudi Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman.

The Saudi prince said this week that he will work to increase the total Riyadh investments in the United States during Trump’s presidency to a trillion dollars from $ 600 billion, and Mr. Trump requested.

“I will ask sanctions against Syria,” said Mr. Trump, speaking in front of the giant projections of American and Saudi flags sitting under a huge chandelier. “Oh, what I do for the crown prince,” he added, drawing laughter from the enthusiastic crowd.

Mr. Trump, who cultivated diplomatic and commercial relations with the Kingdom, fell into a luxurious welcome. The Saudis have launched an honor guard and a team of Arab horses and a crowd of the royal family and business leaders to receive him.

The comfortable relations between Mr. Trump and the Kingdom gave the Gulf leaders an opportunity to pressure to lift sanctions on Syria, many of which see decisive in economic collapse and preventing the new conflict that can spread beyond its borders.

“The Syrian economy is in parts, but the region is preparing, if not desperate, to help restore it on its feet,” wrote Charles Leicester, a senior colleague at the Middle East Institute in Washington. “With the US sanctions on the road, Syria will for the first time in decades looking forward to recovery, rebuilding and reintegration to the world.”

In the Syrian capital, Damascus, people rotated centuries, fake alarms, Syrian and Saudi flags. Some gathered in groups to repeat revolutionary slogans against Mr. Assad. They expressed their happiness that their country may soon be able to reintegrate into the global financial system and start rebuilding.

“Things will be cheaper,” said Intisar Al -Mousa, 49, an employee of the local government. “We will be able to buy our children the things they want and give them a good education. We will be like other countries.”

She came to the scene with her sister, brother, mother and other relatives to celebrate and said that the advertisement had changed her idea of ​​Mr. Trump.

She said, “We have never loved Trump before, but now we love him because he stood with us.”

She also had another desire: “We hope our salaries will rise a little.”

It was not yet clear how comprehensively of the meeting that the US president might have on Wednesday with Mr. Al -Sharra.

A White House official said that Mr. Trump agreed to “Saying Hello” to the Syrian leader while they were both in Saudi Arabia, according to the Press Complex, who is traveling with the American President.

In his speech on Tuesday, Mr. Trump wandered against Iran, one of the international allies in the developed Assad regime. It was called “the largest and most destructive” that threatens the stability and prosperity of the Middle East, and pledged that it will not have a nuclear weapon.

If Mr. Shara gets a face -to -face meeting with Mr. Trump, he will get a rare opportunity to make his case for a global leader who has the power to form the future of Syria. It will also be an amazing shift for a man who once led a branch of al -Qaeda, but he broke the relations with the jihadist group, and seeks to reduce his image in the hope of a broader traction.

In the months that the rebel coalition has passed control of Damascus and the longest Mr. Al -Assad, the United States remained in the place of multi -layer sanctions, with the war, the country to the economic collapse preservation.

Critics of US sanctions have argued that its lifting could allow the flow of international aid and investment to help the country recover from the war.

The European leaders, who are eager to enhance stability and prevent new waves of migration to their beaches, have also prompted more economic participation.

However, even when Europe began lifting some sanctions, a few regional companies or governments were ready to invest in the country under the burden of US sanctions – without knowing whether to raise the wrath of Mr. Trump.

The Trump administration had been for months that kept the emerging Mr. Sharra administration. Some American officials have expressed deep doubts about the motives of Mr. Sharra and his promises to protect religious minorities, pointing to his Islamic orientation and history with al -Qaeda.

The American administration has also issued demands related to combating terrorism and other issues that he said must be fulfilled in order to observe the sanctions.

The Syrian government said that some demands should be negotiated, such as the ban of foreign fighters in the Syrian government and the armed forces. But at the same time, moves were taken towards meeting other demands.

Syria recently brought a team of forensic experts from Qatar to search for the remains of Americans who were killed by the Islamic State.

Syrian intermediaries told the American intermediaries that they sought to avoid conflict with all neighboring countries, including Israel, and welcomed the American investment.

For several months, regional and European leaders have struggled to pay attention from the Trump administration on the sanctions issue.

But the tide began to turn recently. Mr. Trump alluded before his journey in the Middle East to reconsider the case.

Last week, the President of France, Emmanuel Macron, presented a diplomatic batch to Mr. Al-Shara, as the first European leader to host the Syrian President in his capital, pledging to gradually lift the European Union sanctions against Syria-to keep the new leaders to maintain the country on a path towards stability.

Mr. Macron said: “I told the Syrian president that if he continues to follow his path, we will continue our path.”