Syria's new leader says armed factions will come under state control
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Hello, I'm Katya Adler, host of the Global Story podcast from the BBC. Each weekday, we break down one big news story with fresh perspectives from journalists around the world. From artificial intelligence to divisive politics tearing our societies apart, from the movements of money and markets to the human stories that touch our lives, we bring you in-depth insights from across the BBC and beyond. Listen to the Global Story wherever you get your BBC podcasts.
This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service. I'm Andrew Peach and in the early hours of Monday the 23rd of December, these are our main stories. Syria's new leader says he wants all weapons and armed factions to come under state control. Germany promises a thorough investigation into the Magdeburg attack.
Also in this podcast... The Ugandan who's walked and run from Cape Town to London.
We'll be right back. Today, the new de facto leader, Ahmed al-Sharra, addressed those concerns in a news conference with the Turkish foreign minister, Hakan Fidan. He said that armed factions would begin to be dissolved and incorporated into the Syrian army. And he announced plans to bring all weapons in the country under state control, including those held by the mainly Kurdish SDF.
We will not by any means allow for weapons outside the control of the state, whether from revolutionary factions or factions in SDF areas. We need to close this chapter as quickly as possible because the presence of rogue arms in the country is what leads to chaos and unstable security. I think there is wide agreement among the factions. God willing, things will work out well.
Our Middle East regional editor Sebastian Usher is in Beirut and told me more about Turkey's involvement.
Hakan Fidan is the first foreign minister to go to Damascus since the toppling of Bashar al-Assad and the taking of power, essentially, for now at least, by Ahmad al-Shara and his HTS group. Now, what he was saying is, in one sense, a continuation of his efforts... to portray himself as a pragmatist, as a moderate, as a man who wants the future of Syria to be very different from its past, to see a unified Syria after the years of conflict and division. And, of course, that is something to be expected and something that would be welcomed by the rest of the world. And it is a very difficult situation. I mean, there are a number of military groups involved. that are operative in Syria. They include HTS and other similar factions, factions down in the south, which also rose with HTS in the toppling of Bashar al-Assad. ISIS is still operative to an extent. And most importantly, I think perhaps, Is the SDF for Kurdish-led forces over in the northeast?
Now, that's where it gets complicated, because essentially, as we're saying, Turkey was perhaps the key backer of HTS and Ahmad al-Shara, and it sees the SDF as simply an offshoot of the Kurdish separatists in Turkey and regards them as a terror group and has actually mounted several invasions into the north of Syria over the past years. to push them back. So it's interesting that Ahmad al-Shara in this meeting with the Turkish foreign minister should make such a priority of the SDF and that they should give up their weapons. Obviously, if Syria is to be united, that is going to have to happen. But whether taking on the SDF now, endangering some of the gains that the SDF has actually made in terms, I mean, remember that this is the group that with US support essentially defeated ISIS. And it has run the northeast of the country, probably in just about the most efficient way that any part of the country has been run during the conflict. So there's a lot to lose.
And the SDF certainly feels that its position. has coming under more and more attack. It never really took on Assad's forces, but it's certainly now very much the focus of the attentions of Turkey and of Ahmad al-Shara. Obviously, Ahmad al-Shara will hope that there will be no new armed conflict over this, but that is a possibility because the SDF, the Kurdish administration there, feels it has a lot to lose.
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Speakers
21 identified
Andrew Peach 6 min
Shaima Khalil 3 min
Chris Smith 3 min
Sebastian Usher 2 min
George Anton 2 min
Stephen Fry 2 min
Olga Malchevska 1 min
Danny Eberhard 1 min
Katya Adler 1 min
Deo Kato 1 min
Bethany Bell 1 min
Unnamed Witness in Iwao Hakamada Case 1 min
Ali Magbul 1 min
Emir Nader 1 min
Miguel Berger
Ahmed al-Sharra
Emily Buchanan
Unnamed Witness in Magdeburg
Rachel Trawick
Juliet Tuma
Ukrainian Choir
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