Syrian

Barzani meets Syria’s al-Sharaa in Damascus to discuss Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) integration and Kurdish rights in post-Assad Syria.

Nechirvan Barzani, president of Iraq’s semiautonomous Kurdish region, has held talks with Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa, in the first visit by a Kurdish leader to Syria since the fall of ousted Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

On Monday, Barzani led a high-level delegation to Damascus, where he was received at the People’s Palace. According to Syria’s state news agency SANA, the two sides discussed bilateral relations between Erbil and Damascus, as well as several key regional issues of mutual concern to strengthen cooperation and coordination across various fields.

The visit to Syria’s capital comes after months of diplomatic engagement between the Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq and Syria’s new administration. Barzani and al-Sharaa previously met twice on the sidelines of the Antalya Diplomacy Forum, first on April 11, 2025, and again on April 17, 2026. According to a statement from the Kurdistan Region Presidency, the second meeting covered the development of economic ties and the agreement between the Syrian government and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

The integration of the SDF into Syrian state institutions is a central focus of the talks. The SDF, a Kurdish-led force that controls much of northeastern Syria, has been in negotiations with Damascus over its future status. The Syrian government has sought to integrate the force into its military structures, while Kurdish representatives have pressed for guarantees of political and cultural rights.

According to news reports from Al Hadath, Barzani and al-Sharaa discussed mechanisms for entrenching the constitutional rights of Kurds in Syria, particularly language rights and administrative autonomy. Implementation of Decree No. 13, which pertains to Kurdish language rights, was also on the agenda. Syrian officials have expressed interest in benefitting from the Kurdistan Regional Government’s experience in Kurdish-language education, curriculum development and teacher training.

Barzani’s itinerary also includes meetings with Kurdish officials in Syria, including SDF commanders and Kurdish members of the Syrian parliament, according to Kurdish media reports.

The visit follows a series of diplomatic exchanges, including a trip by Syria’s education minister to Erbil and efforts to reopen the Syrian consulate in Iraq’s semiautonomous Kurdish region. Barzani has previously hosted SDF commander Mazloum Abdi and delegations from northeastern Syria in Erbil.

For the Kurdistan Regional Government in Erbil, which shares a 1,100km (684-mile) border with Syria and hosts tens of thousands of Syrian refugees, the engagement carries vital security imperatives. Ensuring a stable, inclusive Syria reduces the risk of the resurgence of ISIL (ISIS), limits future refugee flows, and enhances Erbil’s diplomatic leverage with both Baghdad and Ankara.

The talks come at a sensitive time, during ongoing clashes between Syrian forces and Kurdish fighters in the northeast.

France has returned 23 Syrian antique artefacts it’s held since the outbreak of the 2011 civil war. The collection, spanning from prehistory to the Abbasid era, has been restored to the National Museum in Damascus after French President Emmanuel Macron’s visit.

The new 210-member parliament takes shape, marking a historic shift after decades of Assad family rule.

The first parliament in Syria’s post-Assad era has taken shape with the release of a list of 70 legislators picked by President Ahmed al-Sharaa.

The inauguration of the new parliament on Wednesday shows the country is moving ahead with drafting laws as the nation works on recovering from decades of iron-fist rule under longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad, who was ousted in December 2024 after more than 13 years of civil war, which killed about half a million people.

The head of Syria’s electoral committee, Mohammed Taha al-Ahmad, told reporters that the new 210-member legislature will hold its first meeting on Monday, when the new members will be sworn in, and the parliament’s presidential council will be elected.

Interim President al-Sharaa directly appoints one third of the 210 seats. His list of 70 legislators includes 15 women, raising the number of female members in the legislature to 22.

Syria held the first phase of its parliamentary elections in October last year while excluding the southern province of Suwayda, a predominantly Druze governorate and where no date has been set yet for a vote due to security concerns.

The October vote also excluded northeast Syria, which was under Kurdish control. A vote in that region was held in May after government forces took control of the area during deadly clashes earlier this year.

The new parliament also includes representatives of the Alawite community and two legislators from Suwayda.

“Initially, there was a very small portion of the elected members that were from some of the minority groups, such as the Kurdish community,” said Al Jazeera’s Obaida Hitto, reporting from the capital Damascus.

“The appointees by the president remedied that by adding several more Kurdish members from the Hasakah governorate,” Hitto added.

The new parliament will have a 30-month term and work on a new elections law while preparing the ground for a popular vote in the next elections, according to al-Ahmad, as a test for the country’s transition.

Syrian journalist Mousa al-Omar reportedly filed a complaint about Akkad’s social media comments prior to his arrest.

British Syrian activist Hassan Akkad has been detained by security forces in Damascus, in an alleged response to his online comments criticising a prominent journalist.

Akkad, founder of the Give Us the Money That You Owe! campaign, was taken into custody on Wednesday at about 9:45pm local time (18:45 GMT) while at a cafe in the capital’s al-Malki neighbourhood, the statement said.

His detention appears to be related to a legal complaint filed by Syrian journalist and presenter Mousa al-Omar in relation to “Hassan’s social media activities and public comments”, the campaign reported.

It added that he was summoned by the cybersecurity branch on June 4. Al Jazeera understands that Akkad is still detained.

“He later became aware that additional cases had also been filed against him, although he was not informed of the identities of the complainants,” the campaign said.

Al Jazeera reached out to the Syrian government regarding he case but has yet to receive a response regarding the activist’s arrest.
Public Prosecutor Judge Hossam Khattab confirmed that Akkad had been detained due to a search warrant being issued for him, but that the case against him had been dropped.

Al-Omar told Al Jazeera that he had instructed his lawyer to tell the police that he had dropped the case against Akkad and said he was “saddened” by what had happened.

“I am sorry for what happened to Hassan as a result of his mistakes; I followed the legal path under the cybercrime law… Everything I pledged, amounting to $700,000 in projects and cash, was paid in the donations,” he said.

Akkad’s campaign tracks financial commitments related to a public drive for donations to fund Syria’s reconstruction since the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad.

The activist reportedly criticised al-Omar on social media in recent weeks for allegedly failing to deliver on his financial pledges to the country’s rehabilitation efforts, pledges he claimed were worth thousands of dollars.

The campaign said after Akkad was summoned, he paused his online activities related to the case, to “allow the investigation and legal process to proceed”.

Akkad, a refugee and former English teacher in his late 30s, previously won BAFTA and International Emmy awards for documenting his journey from Turkiye to Europe after fleeing the Syrian civil war that began in 2011, during which he was arrested by the al-Assad’s authorities.

He eventually settled in the United Kingdom in 2015, returning to Syria after years in exile when al-Assad fled the country.

According to witness accounts cited in the statement, five plainclothes security officers entered the coffee shop where Akkad was meeting with several journalists.

Witnesses said the officers initially requested Akkad’s mobile phone before informing him that he was being arrested.

His lawyers said the arrest raises questions about whether authorities followed established legal procedures.

“No legal basis for the arrest … was presented at the time of his detention,” the statement said,

It added that since the allegations appear to be related to his online commentary, the arrest raises “broader concerns regarding the protection of freedom of expression”.

The statement further questioned the reported use of a cybersecurity law enacted during the rule of al-Assad, arguing that reliance on such legislation “appears inconsistent with the interim government’s commitments to expand protections for freedom of expression following the collapse of the previous regime”.

Athens, Greece – Bashir is a Syrian Muslim who has lived in Greece since 2014. He married a fellow Syrian in the country, and three months ago, they had a son. After years of picking olives and oranges, learning Greek and a trade in metalwork, and finally buying his own equipment to start work as an independent trader, Bashir felt his life was finally coming together.

Two months ago, the authorities handed him a piece of paper asking him to restate his reasons for coming to Greece and why he should now return to Syria.

Bashir, who requested to withhold his surname, had been granted asylum in Greece in 2015 because of the civil war then raging in Syria. The war ended in December 2024, and Bashir became one of 1,200 Syrians whose asylum cases were reopened in February.

“It’s a catastrophe,” he told Al Jazeera. “I don’t understand how this can happen. If they decide I should leave the country, should my family stay here?”

Bashir’s lawyer said only men are currently receiving such notices – and not just from Syria but Afghanistan, another country whose civil war is deemed to have ended, with the Taliban’s sweeping victory in August 2021.

But neither Syria nor Afghanistan is necessarily safe to return to, said the lawyer, Angeliki Theodoropoulou.

“We believe this has to do with the European Union’s stance towards Syria and Afghanistan, and with the fact that there are quite a few voluntary returns, which encourages authorities to say, ‘Let’s see if these people can return’,” Theodoropoulou told Al Jazeera.

She said the entire regime of international protection was being tightened for these two nationalities. “We’re also seeing asylum being given in very few cases, and a lot of rejections,” she said.

“We don’t understand on what criteria they decided Syria is safe,” Bashir said.

Earlier this year, renewed clashes erupted between the Syrian government and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), while Israel has continued attacks on the country sporadically.

Bilal said he feels uncomfortable about the idea of living in Syria for cultural and political reasons, having spent 15 years away.

“Many of the refugees here are like me,” he said.

Jihad, who requested to withhold his surname, has similar concerns but for the opposite reason. He has lived in Greece legally since 2001 and runs a small clothes shop. When the regime of Bashar al-Assad fell, the rest of his family also fled, because he and his family were Assad supporters.

He fears that he would be mistreated in Syria over his views.

“If they just look at my Facebook page or look at things I wrote in the past, they will send me to jail for sure,” Jihad said. “I’m afraid even to go to the embassy. I have never held a gun, I have never killed anyone, I just have an opinion.”

Both men have clean criminal records, pay taxes and social security contributions, and have nurtured families in Greece. Both say they would flee to another country rather than return to Syria. So why is Greece considering their eviction?

Greece’s turn to exclusion

Greek Migration Minister Thanos Plevris announced in February that he had ordered a reopening of any asylum cases that could be revoked. As a temporary status, it can be.

Last year, Greece revoked the asylum of almost 200 people, compared with 400 in the previous decade. Dozens more cases are under review this year. And there appears to be a religious element to the policy.

Greece suspended asylum applications for mainly Muslim asylum seekers arriving from Libya for three months last year. Most of the people whose asylum is being revoked are from majority-Muslim countries.

At a recent parliamentary committee hearing, Plevris stated clearly that Greece prefers non-Muslim migrant workers.

“There are countries with which we don’t have common values, and that’s mainly because of religion, let’s be clear, it’s because of hardcore Islam,” Plevris said. “So, you have to pick countries that are religiously neutral or Christian. We’re talking to Georgia, the Philippines, Armenia, India.”

Greece has been tightening its migration policy in other ways as well.

In September 2025, it adopted what Plevris described as “the strictest returns policy in the whole EU”, empowering the government to imprison people who refuse to be deported. Rejected asylum applicants can be fitted with ankle monitors and given just two weeks to remove themselves voluntarily. If they don’t, they face a 5,000-euro fine ($5,870) and two to five years’ confinement in closed camps.

In February, the governing conservative New Democracy party passed a law stipulating that if any aid worker is charged with helping to smuggle asylum seekers into Greece, their entire aid organisation can be delisted from the ministry’s registry. That means they could lose their funding and access to refugee camps, and could shut down.

The broader context

Europe is undergoing a transition as it prepares to put into force an Asylum and Migration Pact next month. The pact demands a hard-border policy and a returns policy for rejected asylum seekers, both of which each member state must manage itself.

“We’re at a pivotal point in time. We’re about to see the implementation of the European pact. This will fundamentally change the way that migration works,” Kristin Fabbe, chair in Business and Comparative Politics at the European University Institute, recently told a Delphi Economic Forum event in Athens.

The largest bottleneck, she said, “is that Europe has not yet figured out how to do returns at scale … in order to reform asylum and reform migration, you have to execute returns at scale, and the data show that that has been impossible”.

Greece, an EU front-line state, already has 938,000 legally resident migrants in a population of 10.3 million, a relatively high number. Of these, more than 137,000 are recipients of asylum or international protection.

As the Middle East and North Africa region remains unstable, the government is worried about the potential scale of future refugee flows.

More than a million asylum seekers crossed the Greek borders in 2015. In the years that followed, certain EU members took on thousands of asylum cases from Greece and Italy in a show of solidarity, and tens of thousands more asylum recipients in Greece moved to other EU states. Those states have agreed to keep them, but that would not necessarily happen again under the pact.

Observers say this explains Greece’s hardline attitude.

Commenting on the political mood in Europe, Fabbe said, “The legality, the sanctity of the [returns] solutions is being challenged, but I think we’re going to see the proliferation of those solutions and new institutional mechanisms.”

Syrian commission confirms the deaths of Rania al-Abbasi’s six children, missing since 2013 under Bashar al-Assad’s rule.

Syria’s National Commission for Missing Persons (NCMP) says the children of dentist and former chess champion Rania al‑Abbasi, who disappeared with their parents more than a decade ago under then-President Bashar al-Assad, are likely dead.

“We have reached reliable and corroborating results that allow us to conclude with a high degree of professional certainty that Dr Rania al-Abbasi’s children are deceased,” the NCMP said in a statement on Saturday.

The fate of the children, unknown for years, became a symbol of the plight of other missing children of detainees and those forcibly disappeared during al-Assad’s rule, which ended with his ouster in 2024.

Al-Abbasi went missing along with her husband, Abdul Rahman Yasin, and their six children, aged three to 15, in March 2013 after government forces raided their home in Damascus, according to rights groups.

The commission, set up by the country’s new rulers in May 2025 to investigate missing and forcibly disappeared people, said its findings were “based on multiple verification and analysis procedures” conducted in coordination with national authorities.

“Efforts to find the remains … are still ongoing,” it added.

Hassan al-Abbasi, Rania’s brother, confirmed the children’s deaths in a video posted on Facebook.

He said the family had been able to view video recordings linked to the main suspect in a 2013 massacre in a Damascus district, including one showing him accusing children in a dark room of being “major financiers of terrorism”.

“They turned out to be our children,” Hassan al-Abbasi said. “We finally saw them … but they were martyred.”

The fate of Rania and her husband remains officially unknown after all contact with them was lost following their arrest on accusations linked to opposition to the Assad government.

Rights groups and media reports suggest they may have died, though their bodies were never found.

The issue of missing people remains one of the most pressing in Syria. They include detainees who vanished in government prisons as well as people who went missing during fighting, at checkpoints or while fleeing their homes over the years of civil war.

Tens of thousands of people were detained or disappeared during the war, which erupted in 2011 after a brutal crackdown on antigovernment protests by al-Assad.

The NCMP said last year that the number of people who went missing over decades of al-Assad family rule may exceed 300,000.

Notorious al-Assad regime figure linked to killings

Separately on Saturday, the Syrian Ministry of Interior said its investigation into the disappearance of al-Abbasi’s children had uncovered evidence linking Amjad Youssef – a notorious figure during al-Assad’s rule and the perpetrator of the 2013 Tadamon massacre – to their killing.

In a statement, it said interrogations of detainees, together with videos and information shared by the NCMP, had helped strengthen the case.

Youssef was arrested in April, prompting many Syrians to demand “just punishment” for a man they say carried out the massacre in cold blood.

The Tadamon case drew international attention after footage surfaced documenting the killings.

In 2022, The Guardian newspaper in the United Kingdom published footage it said had been leaked by a conscript in a pro-government militia showing members of the Assad-era Military Intelligence Branch 227 killing at least 41 people and burning their bodies.

The video showed an intelligence officer, identified as Youssef, shooting blindfolded and bound detainees.

People in southern Lebanon are living under “psychological terror” from Israeli air attacks and displacement orders.

Israeli forces launched a new wave of air attacks in Lebanon on Saturday after earlier raids killed 10 people, targeting an area near the Syrian border and several villages in southern Lebanon.

Lebanon’s National News Agency said there were five Israeli air attacks shortly before midnight in the mountainous Nabi Sreij area on the outskirts of Brital, which had been spared from attacks since April 17. On Saturday,  the agency reported large explosions in the towns of Yohmor al-Shaqif in Nabatieh and Taybeh in the Marjayoun district, both in southern Lebanon.

On Thursday, an Israeli attack near the Tebnine Hospital in southern Lebanon damaged all three floors of the building, including ‌the ‌emergency room, intensive care unit, surgical ward, and ambulances parked outside, according to the Ministry of Public Health.

Israel’s military had issued two forced displacement warnings since Friday night via its Arabic-language spokesman Avichay Adraee, for the southern Lebanese village of Burj Rahal and the areas of Tyre and Zqouq al-Mufdi.

Al Jazeera’s Obaida Hitto, reporting from Tyre, southern Lebanon, at the edge of the 500-metre (550-yard) perimeter that Israel has designated as the danger zone, said: “There are ambulances here. There are also rescue teams and people who have fled their homes this evening following this forced [displacement] order.”

Many left in fear and panic, he said, seeing these orders as threats while being unsure of when they could return home.

“People are here with their families and their children,” Hitto said. “This is the kind of psychological terror that Israel is forcing people to live in, here in southern Lebanon.”

More than 3,100 people have been killed in Lebanon ⁠since Israeli forces escalated attacks on the country on March 2, and attacks have continued despite a ceasefire announced by United States President Donald Trump on April 16. The dead include 123 medics, more than 210 children and nearly 300 women, according to statistics shared by Lebanon’s Health Ministry on Friday.