Syria’s President Ahmed al-Sharaa is visiting Germany on Monday for talks on the Middle East war, rebuilding his country and Berlin’s efforts to send back Syrian refugees.
Sharaa, on his first trip to Germany since ousting Syria’s longtime leader Bashar al-Assad in late 2024, is expected to meet Chancellor Friedrich Merz and President Frank-Walter Steinmeier.
The former Islamist rebel leader has managed to build relations with Western governments and made several overseas trips, including to the United States, France and Russia.
As a result, many international sanctions on Syria have been lifted to help the country rebuild after its bloody 14-year civil war.
German government spokesman Stefan Kornelius said Merz and Sharaa would discuss the Middle East war, Syria’s political situation and reconstruction efforts, and the return of Syrians to their homeland.
While in Berlin, Sharaa will also join a political and business forum exploring “prospects for economic recovery and the reconstruction of Syria”, a German foreign ministry spokesman said.
“With the lifting of numerous EU, UN and other sanctions following the end of the Assad regime, the foundations for (economic recovery) have been laid,” he said.
Ahead of the visit, the German interior ministry announced a new initiative to provide support to Syria’s disaster management ministry and help train emergency services.
Asked whether the talks would also address the case of German journalist Eva Maria Michelmann, who is missing in Syria, the foreign ministry spokesman said Berlin was “looking into” the matter.
‘No grounds for asylum’
Roughly one million Syrians fled their war-torn country for Germany in recent years, many of them arriving at the peak of the migrant influx in 2015-16 to escape the civil war.
The conservative Merz, who took power last May, has stepped up a drive to limit irregular immigration as he seeks to counter the rise of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.
Merz said last year that, with Syria’s civil war over, people from that country now have “no grounds for asylum in Germany”.
The government in December resumed deporting criminals to Syria, though only a handful of cases have gone ahead so far.
Merz also said he assumed many Syrians would return home voluntarily, drawing criticism from campaign groups who cite continued instability and rights abuses in Syria.
READ ALSO: Conservatives call for further tightening of migration policy in Germany
Since Sharaa has been in power, sectarian tensions have continued to cause repeated bloodshed, while the Islamic State group remains active.
After Assad’s overthrow, Israel moved its forces into the UN-patrolled demilitarised zone on the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights, and has carried out hundreds of strikes in Syria as well as regular incursions.
Protest against visit
Sharaa was initially planning to visit Germany in January, but the trip was postponed as he sought to end fighting between Syrian government forces and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces in the country’s north.
The KGD group that represents the Kurdish community in Germany charged that Sharaa “bears responsibility for numerous human rights violations, war crimes and crimes against humanity”.
“Back in January, together with other civil society organisations, we had already voiced strong criticism of the planned visit and called for protests,” said Ali Ertan Toprak, chairman of the group.
“Despite these objections, the German government has so far stood by the invitation. We consider this to be expressly wrong.”
Representatives of the Syrian Christian Aramean minority meanwhile called for a “comprehensive political approach that recognises and institutionally anchors the country’s historic diversity”.
A demonstration against the plan to send refugees back to Syria has been registered in Berlin on Monday under the motto “No deportation deals with human rights abusers”.
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