UK in contact with Syrian rebels who toppled Assad
The Independent|December 16, 2024
The UK foreign secretary David Lammy has said the government has opened “diplomatic contact” with the Syrian rebels who ousted Bashar al-Assad’s regime last weekend.
ALEX CROFT
UK in contact with Syrian rebels who toppled Assad

Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) is still a proscribed terrorist organisation in the UK, Mr Lammy said yesterday, during remarks in which he also announced a £50m humanitarian aid package for vulnerable Syrians.

“We want to see a representative government, an inclusive government. We want to see chemical weapons stockpiles secured, and not used, and we want to ensure that there is not continuing violence,” Mr Lammy told the BBC.

“For all of those reasons, using all the channels that we have available, and those are diplomatic and of course intelligence-led channels, we seek to deal with HTS where we have to.”

Since HTS led the rebel offensive which caused the collapse of the Assad regime, Western governments have debated how the new Syrian rulers should be approached, given HTS’s links to alQaeda. His US counterpart Antony Blinken said on Saturday the US had made “direct contact” with HTS.

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