Bashar al-Assad's location is revealed after Syrian despot flees country and resigns following collapse of his regime
By Miriam Kuepper
Daily Mail
Dec 8, 2024
Al-Assad and his family have arrived in Russia and have been granted asylum in Moscow, Russian state media claimed, citing a Kremlin source (file image of al-Assad, his wife Asma al-Assad (C) walking with their children, Hafez (2nd-R), Karim (R) and Zein (L) in 2022)
Bashar al-Assad's location has been revealed after the Syrian despot fled his country and resigned following the collapse of his regime.
Al-Assad and his family have arrived in Russia and have been granted asylum in Moscow, the country's state media claimed, citing a Kremlin source.
The Interfax news agency quoted the unnamed source as saying: 'President Assad of Syria has arrived in Moscow. Russia has granted them (him and his family) asylum on humanitarian grounds.'
Asked whether Assad was confirmed to be in the Russian capital, a Western official said they believed that was likely the case and had no reason to doubt Moscow's claim.
Al-Assad reportedly fled Syria on a Russian plane. Flight tracking website Flightradar24 showed that a plane from Latakia, west Syria, arrived in Moscow a few hours ago, the BBC reports. Latakia is home to a Russian air force base.
He reportedly left his home country early Sunday, and Syrians have been pouring into streets echoing with celebratory gunfire after a stunning rebel advance reached the capital, ending the al-Assad family's 50 years of iron rule.
'Maybe he thought he knew that this was coming so kind of tried to take himself and leave everyone else,' Colonel Philip Ingram, a former British Army intelligence officer, told MailOnline about al-Assad's rumoured move to Russia.
Al-Assad's reported asylum, his longtime ally and protector, comes as Syrian opposition leaders guaranteed the safety of Russian military bases and diplomatic missions inside Syria, Russian news agencies reported on Sunday, citing a Kremlin source.
'President Assad of Syria has arrived in Moscow. Russia has granted them (him and his family) asylum on humanitarian grounds,' a source said. Al-Assad is pictured hugging Russian president Putin above in 2017
An anti-government fighter tears down a portrait of Syria's President Bashar al-Assad in Aleppo, after jihadists and their allies entered the northern Syrian city, on November 30, 2024
The TASS state news agency said: 'Russian officials are in contact with representatives of the armed Syrian opposition, whose leaders have guaranteed the safety of Russian military bases and diplomatic institutions on the territory of Syria.'
Russia, Assad's biggest backer along with Iran, holds a naval base in Tartus and a military airfield in Khmeimim.
Moscow's forces became militarily involved in the Syrian conflict in 2015, providing support for Assad's forces to crush the opposition in the bloody civil war.
'Russia has always been in favour of a political solution to the Syrian crisis. Our starting point is the need to resume negotiations under the auspices of the UN,' the Kremlin source added.
A Russian representative to the United Nations announced that Moscow had requested an emergency closed-door meeting of the UN Security Council on the situation in Syria for Monday afternoon.
'The consequences (of the events in Syria) for this country and the whole region have not yet been measured,' the official said on Telegram.
Joyful crowds gathered in squares in Damascus, waving the Syrian revolutionary flag in scenes that recalled the early days of the Arab Spring uprising, before a brutal crackdown and the rise of an insurgency plunged the country into a nearly 14-year civil war.
Others gleefully ransacked the presidential palace and residence after al-Assad and other top officials vanished.
People kick a poster depicting Syrian President Bashar al Assad after Syria's army command notified officers that al-Assad's 24-year rule has ended
People sit on a tank as they gather at Umayyad Square in Damascus on December 8, 2024
Abu Mohammed al-Golani, a former al-Qaida commander who cut ties with the group years ago and says he embraces pluralism and religious tolerance, leads the biggest rebel faction and is poised to chart the country's future.
In his first public appearance since fighters entered the Damascus suburbs Saturday, al-Golani visited the sprawling Umayyad Mosque and called al-Assad's fall 'a victory to the Islamic nation.'
Calling himself by his given name, Ahmad al-Sharaa, and not his nom de guerre, he told hundreds of people that al-Assad had made Syria 'a farm for Iran's greed.'
The rebels face the daunting task of healing bitter divisions in a country ravaged by war and still split among armed factions. Turkey-backed opposition fighters are battling U.S.-allied Kurdish forces in the north, and the Islamic State group is still active in some remote areas.
Syrian state television broadcast a rebel statement early Sunday saying al-Assad had been overthrown and all prisoners had been released.
They called on people to preserve the institutions of 'the free Syrian state'. The rebels later announced a curfew in Damascus from 4pm to 5am.
The rebels said they freed people held at the notorious Saydnaya prison, where rights groups say thousands were tortured and killed.
A video circulating online purported to show rebels breaking open cell doors and freeing dozens of female prisoners, many of whom appeared shocked. At least one small child was seen among them.
'This happiness will not be completed until I can see my son out of prison and know where is he,' said one relative, Bassam Masr. 'I have been searching for him for two hours. He has been detained for 13 years.'
Rebel commander Anas Salkhadi later appeared on state TV and sought to reassure Syria's religious and ethnic minorities, saying: 'Syria is for everyone, no exceptions. Syria is for Druze, Sunnis, Alawites, and all sects.'
'We will not deal with people the way the al-Assad family did,' he added.
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