Syrians displaced by years of civil war can now return home, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said on Sunday after Islamist-led rebels declared they had taken Damascus, Agence France-Presse reported.
Ousted President Bashar al-Assad is “probably outside of Syria,” Fidan said when asked in Qatar about Assad’s whereabouts and whether his life might be in danger. On Saturday, Fidan met at the Doha Forum with his counterparts from Assad allies Iran and Russia.
The “Assad regime collapsed and control of the country is changing hands,” Fidan said at the Doha Forum in Qatar, adding that “this didn’t happen overnight. For the last 13 years, the country has been in turmoil” since the civil war began with Assad’s repression of democracy protests in 2011.
“Millions of Syrians who were forced to leave their homes can return to their land,” Fidan said, adding that it was “time to unite and reconstruct the country.”
Fidan said that any new government in Syria must not threaten neighboring nations.
Fidan said Turkey had worked with Syrians and regional and international actors to “assure the regional countries that the new administration and new Syria will not pose a threat for its neighbors. On the contrary, the new Syria will address the existing problems, will eliminate the threats.”
Turkey’s foreign minister said Ankara has been in contact with rebels in Syria to ensure the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group and the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) cannot expand there after anti-government forces took Damascus.
“We have to be watchful during this transition period,” Fidan said. “We have communication with the groups to make sure that terrorist organizations, especially Daesh and the PKK, are not taking advantage of the situation.”