DAMASCUS (Reuters) – Syria's new foreign minister told his Ukrainian counterpart on Monday that Syria hopes to establish “strategic partnerships” with Ukraine, as Kiev seeks to build ties with the new Islamist rulers in Damascus amid declining Russian influence.
Russia was a strong ally of ousted President Bashar al-Assad and granted him political asylum. Moscow said it is in contact with the new administration in Damascus, including about the fate of Russian military facilities in Syria.
The newly appointed Syrian Foreign Minister, Asaad Hassan Al-Shaibani, told Ukrainian correspondent Andriy Sipha: “There will be strategic partnerships between us and Ukraine at the political, economic, and social levels, and scientific partnerships.”
“The Syrian people and the Ukrainian people certainly have the same experience and the same suffering that we have endured for 14 years,” he added, apparently drawing a parallel between Syria's brutal civil war of 2011-2024 and Russia's seizure of Ukrainian territory that culminated in its full invasion. -The size of the 2022 invasion.
Al-Sabiha, who also met with the new de facto ruler of Syria, Ahmed Al-Sharaa, in Damascus on Monday, said that Ukraine will send more food aid shipments to Syria after the expected arrival of 20 flour shipments on Tuesday.
Last Friday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky announced the sending of the first batch of Ukrainian food aid to Syria, consisting of 500 metric tons of wheat flour as part of the “Grains from Ukraine” humanitarian initiative in Kiev in cooperation with the United Nations World Food Programme.
Decreased Russian influence
Ukraine, a global producer and exporter of grains and oilseeds, traditionally exports wheat and corn to countries in the Middle East, but not to Syria, which imported food from Russia during the Assad era.
Russian and Syrian sources told Reuters in early December that Russian wheat supplies to Syria had been halted due to uncertainty about the new government in Damascus and delayed payments. Russia supplied wheat to Syria using complex financial and logistical arrangements to circumvent Western sanctions imposed on both Moscow and Damascus.
The overthrow of Assad by the Islamist Sharia group, Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham, has put the future of Russian military bases in Syria – the Hmeimim air base in Latakia and the naval facility in Tartus – into question.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that the status of Russian military bases will be the subject of negotiations with the new leadership in Damascus.
Al-Sharaa said this month that Syria's relations with Russia must serve common interests. In an interview published on Sunday, he said that Syria shared strategic interests with Russia, using a conciliatory tone, but did not go into details.
