On the Meeting Between the Director of the Syrian Regional Platform at the U.S. State Department and the President of the Syrian Interim Government

The official website of the U.S. Embassy in Damascus mentioned in a tweet that the Director of the Syrian Regional Platform at the U.S. State Department, Nicholas Granger, met yesterday, Thursday, with the President of the Syrian Interim Government, Abdurrahman Mustafa, and his ministers “to discuss efforts to meet the needs of Syrians, including efforts to increase respect for human rights, ensure accountability and justice, enhance safety and security, and encourage investment and economic growth.”

Syrian Future Movement (SFM) Comment:

We see this meeting as a strategic response to Bashar al-Assad’s visit to Russia, indicating that Russia’s relations with the Syrian regime are matched by America’s relations with the Syrian opposition.
We support and encourage any rapprochement between the official Syrian opposition and the United States, and we are ready in the Syrian Future Movement (SFM) to work on strengthening and deepening these relations due to our acceptable connections with all parties, aiming to achieve a genuine settlement of the Syrian issue that alleviates the suffering of our people.
The statement speaks of four efforts that must be made to meet the needs of Syrians, outlined as follows:

Increasing respect for human rights through institutional work and good governance, ensuring freedom of opinion and transparency, and guaranteeing freedom of the press and political and social diversity.
Ensuring accountability and justice through the independence of the judiciary, protecting judges, and supporting the rule of law.
Enhancing safety and security by institutionalizing and controlling weapons, stopping corruption, supporting judicial enforcement, and ensuring military and armed forces comply with transparency and law through an effective administrative hierarchy.
Encouraging investment and economic growth, which we emphasized in our economic office through a paper presented by the Center for Research and Studies titled: “The Syrian Solution Through the Gateway of the Economy.”

These steps align with what we advocated in the paper presented by the President of the Syrian Future Movement (SFM), Dr. Zaher Baadarani, at the “First Investment Conference in Northern Syria,” held in the industrial city of Al-Rai, northern Syria, from January 17-18, 2024. In our paper published on our official website, titled “To the First Investment Conference in Northern Syria… Let It Be a Declared Liberal Capitalism,” we highlighted the potential factors for successful investment work and improving the Syrian economy in the north. We emphasized that the points raised by the Director of the Syrian Regional Platform at the U.S. State Department, Nicholas Granger, were areas we had previously identified and highlighted as crucial for driving the economy and investment in northern Syria.
Through our economic office, we have repeatedly emphasized the importance of giving the economy a role in driving political change, as detailed and confirmed in our paper published on our official website, titled: “The Economy as a Factor for Political Change in Syria.”
Finally, we in the Syrian Future Movement (SFM) affirm our support for every step that alleviates the suffering of our people and pushes towards a genuine, just settlement of the Syrian situation by implementing relevant international resolutions, establishing international law and human rights in Syria, and making the economy a priority alongside political change, ensuring its success.

News and Commentary: On the Meeting Between the Director of the Syrian Regional Platform at the U.S. State Department and the President of the Syrian Interim Government