Orientul Mijlociu

In the chaos following the collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s regime in December 2024, looting on a massive scale hit Syria’s armories. Tens of thousands of small arms and light weapons flowed into the hands of civilians, criminals, and armed groups in a country which already had a thriving illicit arms market and established smuggling networks. Failure to monitor and tackle the spread of these weapons could pose a major security threat to Syria itself and the wider region.

Less than two weeks after rebel forces led by Ahmad al-Sharaa ousted Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria, a U.S. State Department delegation arrived in Damascus to talk with the country’s new leader.

It was a meeting few could have predicted. Roughly a decade earlier, the U.S. had declared al-Sharaa — a onetime Al Qaeda commander who went by the nom de guerre Abu Mohammad al-Jolani — a designated global terrorist with a $10 million bounty on his head.

The investigation, based on field testimonies, satellite imagery, and internal communications, points to a chain of command that runs through the Ministry of Defense, with particular focus on its spokesperson, Hassan Abdel Ghani.

A new investigative report has uncovered the involvement of military factions affiliated with Syria’s Ministry of Defense in the killing of approximately 1,500 Alawite civilians across more than 40 locations in rural Latakia and Tartus during a three-day period in March 2025. The findings, published by Reuters, implicate at least 12 armed groups—half of which are under international sanctions for prior human rights violations—in a coordinated campaign of massacres that raises serious questions about command responsibility within Damascus.

How many people does Apartheid Israel have to kill before the World acts decisively to stop the killing? In 1960 the World responded to the killing of 69 Africans with Sanctions on Apartheid South Africa. By 25 April 2025 deaths from violence and deprivation in the Gaza Genocide totalled 680,000 but the World ignores deaths from imposed deprivation that are 4 times violent deaths. Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) on Apartheid Israel and all its supporters NOW.

High-profile figures from the former regime are being captured by the authorities in Damascus

Former warlord Ghazwan Al Salmoni carved a niche in the Syrian civil war, commanding an abduction and extortion ring that specialised in ambushing lorry cargo traffic near his home in the centre of the country.

On May 14, President Donald Trump stood smiling with Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman and Syria’s self-declared leader, Ahmed al-Shara’a, on the sidelines of the President’s visit to Riyadh. After the get together, the President declared that the United States would lift sanctions on Syria and re-establish diplomatic relations between the two countries.

The Islamic State (IS) has returned to the spotlight in Damascus. According to the Syrian Ministry of Interior, the group conducted a suicide bombing on June 22 at a Greek Orthodox church in the Syrian capital, killing at least 25 and wounding more than 60. The bombing marked the group’s first attack in Damascus since the fall of the Bashar al-Assad regime.

L’OCS peut ce que l’OTAN ne peut pas : désamorcer les hostilités en assurant une «sécurité indivisible» à ses États membres eurasiatiques et de par le monde multipolaire.

Les ministres de la Défense des dix membres de l’Organisation de coopération de Shanghai (OCS) se sont réunis la semaine dernière à Qingdao, dans la province chinoise du Shandong.