Trump meets with Syria's former-insurgent-turned-leader in Saudi Arabia

US President Donald Trump on Wednesday met with Syrias interim President Ahmad alSharaa the first such encounter between the two nations leaders in 25 yearsThe meeting on the sidelines of Trump sitting with the leaders of the Gulf Cooperation Council marks a major turn of events for a Syria still adjusting to life after the over 50year irongripped rule of the Assad familyIts also remarkable given alSharaa under the nom de guerre Abu Mohammed alGolani has ties to alQaida and joined insurgents battling US forces in Iraq before entering the Syrian warTrump on Tuesday announced the meeting saying the US also would move to lift economic sanctions on Syria as well Syria even before its ruinous civil war that began in 2011 struggled under a tightly controlled socialist economy and under sanctions by the US as being a statesponsor of terror since 1979The meeting took place behind closed doors and reporters were not permitted to witness the engagement The White House did not immediately say who else was in the meeting or provide any other details on the conversationTrump said he was looking to give Syria which is emerging from more than a decade of brutal civil war a chance at peace under alSharaaAlSharaa was named interim president of Syria in January a month after a stunning offensive by insurgent groups led by alSharaas Hayat Tahrir alSham or HTS that stormed Damascus ending the 54year rule of the Assad familyThe United States has been weighing how to handle alSharaa since he took power in DecemberMany Gulf Arab leaders have rallied behind the new government in Damascus and want Trump to follow believing it is a bulwark against Irans return to influence in Syria where it had helped prop up Assads government during a decades long civil warBut longtime US ally Israel has been deeply sceptical of alSharaas extremist past and cautioned against swift recognition of the new government However Trump cited the intervention of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman as key to his decisionThe White House earlier signalled that the Trump and alSharaa engagement on the sidelines of a Gulf Cooperation Council meeting in Riyadh convened as part of Trumps fourday visit to the region would be brief with the administration saying the US president had agreed to say hello to the Syrian president on WednesdayAlSharaa is the first Syrian leader to meet an American president since Hafez Assad met Bill Clinton in Geneva in 2000Syrians cheered the announcement by Trump that the US will move to lift sanctions on the beleaguered Middle Eastern nationThe staterun SANA news agency published video and photographs of Syrians cheering in Umayyad Square the largest in the countrys capital Damascus Others honked their car horns or waved the new Syrian flag in celebrationPeople whistled and cheered the news as fireworks lit the night skyA statement from Syrias Foreign Ministry issued Tuesday night called the announcement a pivotal turning point for the Syrian people as we seek to emerge from a long and painful chapter of warThe statement also was careful to describe the sanctions as coming in response to the war crimes committed by the Assad regime against the Syrian peoplerather than the wartorn nations new interim governmentThe removal of these sanctions offers a vital opportunity for Syria to pursue stability selfsufficiency and meaningful national reconstruction led by and for the Syrian people the statement addedThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoeveratOptionskeyd0ddb8ef8f1a62a8cdd22fac27fc5ea7formatiframeheight90width728params