Tens of thousands celebrate as Syria marks one year since Assad’s ouster

AFP | Damascus

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Tens of thousands took to the streets across Syria yesterday to celebrate a year since the toppling of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad, with President Ahmed al-Sharaa urging people to unite to rebuild the country.

Sharaa’s Islamist-led alliance launched a lightning offensive in late November last year and took Damascus on December 8 after nearly 14 years of war, ending more than five decades of Assad family rule.

Military personnel marched in Damascus as helicopters flew overhead with Sharaa and several ministers in attendance, state media reported. Parades and large celebrations were also held in other major cities including Aleppo.

Sharaa is expected to speak later Monday.

The war, which erupted in 2011 with the then-government’s brutal crackdown on democracy protests, killed more than half a million people and displaced millions from their homes.

Jubilant crowds thronged the streets of the capital, many people waving Syrian flags, AFP correspondents said, after mosques in the Old City began the day broadcasting celebratory prayers at dawn. “What happened over the past year seems like a miracle,” said Iyad Burghol, 44, a doctor, noting major developments including President Donald Trump’s embrace of Sharaa, a former jihadist who once had a US bounty on his head.

After years of war and economic crisis, people need basics like electricity “but the most important thing to me is civil peace”, Burghol told AFP.

Sharaa has made progress abroad like restoring Syria’s international standing and winning sanctions relief, but he faces major challenges at home including gaining people’s trust, guaranteeing security, rebuilding institutions and keeping his fractured country united.

“The current phase requires the unification of efforts by all citizens to build a strong Syria, consolidate its stability, safeguard its sovereignty, and achieve a future befitting the sacrifices of its people,” Sharaa said following dawn prayers at Damascus’s famous Umayyad Mosque.

He was wearing military garb as he did when he entered the capital a year ago.