Will the EU ease sanctions on Syria? Inside the Block’s Dilemma syrian war news

The EU’s top diplomats are scheduled to meet on Jan. 27 to discuss easing sanctions on Syria to revive the country’s struggling economy amid questions about the political direction of the war-torn nation’s new administration.

When EU foreign ministers gather, the specific sanctions they will consider will include travel bans, Syrian exports of oil and gas and access to infrastructure and humanitarian aid, as well as the gradual lifting of restrictions on financial transactions. In addition, two European diplomatic sources have information. Al Jazeera reported on the ongoing discussions in Brussels.

Earlier in January, the United States relaxed some sanctions for six months to facilitate the flow of humanitarian aid, some energy sales and individual remittances into Syria.

The European Union is considering its move. In recent weeks, hordes of EU officials have appeared in Damascus show Support for a new interim government led by members of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the rebel group that overthrew Bashar al-Assad. The United Nations imposed sanctions on the group in 2014 due to its ties to al-Qaeda. And in 2018, the US and the EU designated HTS as a “terrorist” organization.

But even while reaching out to Syria’s interim leader Ahmed al-Sharaa, EU leaders have issued a warning: They want the new Syrian leadership to form an inclusive government that respects human rights and minorities.

The 27-member group is wary of what direction al-Sharaa might take. “There don’t seem to be indisputable signs that everything has changed,” said one of the two diplomats, referring to HTS’s poor record on human rights. In 2020, the European Union condemned HTS’s “systematic practice” of torturing and killing civilians living in areas under its control and said the group’s actions could constitute war crimes or crimes against humanity.

The worst-case scenario would be to lift sanctions and then have the new administration impose restrictions on the rights of women or minorities, the diplomat said.

Al-Sharaa joined al-Qaeda in Iraq in 2003 and later established the armed group’s branch in Syria, known as Jabhat al-Nusra. It broke ties with al-Qaeda and joined with other factions to be rebranded as HTS in 2017. Before the lightning strike that toppled the al-Assad regime in December, the group controlled the country’s northwestern region of Idlib, where it was estimated to have up to 30,000 fighters.

The Syrian leader has repeatedly denounced extremism. He has also tried to project a liberal image, promising to bring in an inclusive government. Experts say convincing Western powers to lift sanctions is crucial to the success of the new government because the initial euphoria that followed al-Assad’s fall could give way to despair and violence if economic relief is not sufficient. Not available quickly.

It is estimated that 90 percent of Syria’s population lives in poverty. The country’s gross domestic product (GDP) today is less than $9 billion, whereas in 2010 it was $60 billion. Most areas receive only two to three hours of state-supplied electricity per day. The new administration lacks the resources to tackle daunting tasks – from paying civil servants and rebuilding entire cities reduced to rubble to preparing road maps for elections and guaranteeing heat during the winter.

“It’s easy to fail an exam – there are so many reasons why things go wrong,” said Sultan Barakat, a professor of public policy at Qatar’s Hamad Bin Khalifa University.

Barakat argued that restrictions that directly hinder the country’s ability to rebuild – such as those that prevent expatriates from investing in the production sector or those that affect travel – should be lifted immediately and without Of any condition. The EU may discuss sanctions on individuals or HTS at a later stage.

“We can only make decisions based on what they (the al-Sharaa-led administration) say and what they say is okay – now they (Western governments) can help implement what they say Or they may be suspicious and create obstacles for them,” she said.

After Russia and Iran, Syria is the third country in the world where most sanctions are imposed. In the 1970s, the US included the country on its list of states sponsoring “terrorism” over its occupation of eastern Lebanon. A number of other sanctions were imposed by both the US and the EU over the following decades, including over al-Assad’s support for Hezbollah and the brutal repression of pro-democracy protests in 2011 that followed more than 13 years of war. ,

One of the weakest sanctions is the Caesar Act imposed by the US in 2019, which effectively bans states and private businesses from doing business with al-Assad’s government. The EU imposed sanctions on exports and imports, infrastructure projects and financial aid for trade.

Without the full removal of restrictions on the energy sector and financial transactions – on top of personal remittances – the EU proposal for US exemptions and regional sanctions may prove insufficient to guarantee stability for the new administration and attract private investors. Could, said Samir Aita, a Syrian economist and president of the France-based Chamber of Arab Economists.

“You need to speed up the process,” Aita said. “If the Syrian state and its institutions have no functioning and only NGOs can function, they will replace the state,” he said. He said with the central bank still under sanctions, there was a risk of the country turning into a “cash economy”, which could lead to uncontrolled flows of money to various groups and militias, “and that means chaos”.

Europe will be directly affected by such instability. Julian Barnes-Dacey, Middle East director, said, “The EU has been in the direct fire of the Syrian conflict in terms of migration, terrorism and wider instability, so there is a clear interest in seeing a stable Syria moving forward.” Program at the Council on European Foreign Relations.

More than one million Syrians have sought refuge in Europe since the start of the war. And with anti-immigrant sentiment rising across the bloc, some European governments are promising to create economic conditions for refugees to return home, which could prove a profitable election stunt.

But so far, political engagement has not been matched by any meaningful physical steps to support change, Barnes-Dacey said. He said, “There is a real risk that if they wait too long, worsening conditions will undermine the prospects for the change they want to see accomplished.”