BEIRUT (AP) — A prominent Lebanese politician held talks on Sunday with the insurgent who led the overthrow of Syria’s President Bashar Assad, with both expressing hope for a new era in relations between their countries.
Druze leader Walid Jumblatt was a longtime critic of Syria’s involvement in Lebanon and blamed Assad’s father, former President Hafez Assad, for the assassination of his own father decades ago. He is the most prominent Lebanese politician to visit Syria since the Assad family’s 54-year rule came to an end.
He held talks with Ahmad al-Sharaa, formerly known as Abu Mohammed al-Golani, who led the Sunni Islamist rebels who swept into Damascus earlier this month and forced the younger Assad from power.
“We salute the Syrian people for their great victories and we salute you for your battle that you waged to get rid of oppression and tyranny that lasted over 50 years,” said Jumblatt, a key figure in Lebanon’s Druze minority and the former leader of a leftist party.
He expressed hope that Lebanese-Syrian relations “will return to normal.”
Jumblatt’s father, Kamal, was killed in 1977 in an ambush near a Syrian roadblock during Syria’s military intervention in Lebanon’s civil war. The younger Jumblatt was a critic of the Assads, though he briefly allied with them at one point to gain influence in Lebanon’s ever-shifting political alignments.
“Syria was a source of concern and disturbance, and its interference in Lebanese affairs was negative,” al-Sharaa said, referring to the Assad government. “Syria will no longer be a case of negative interference in Lebanon,” he said, pledging that it would respect Lebanese sovereignty.
Al-Sharaa also repeated longstanding allegations that Assad’s government was behind the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, which was followed by other killings of prominent Lebanese critics of Assad.
Last year, the United Nations closed an international tribunal investigating the assassination after it convicted three members of Lebanon’s Hezbollah — an ally of Assad — in absentia. Hezbollah denied involvement in the massive Feb. 14, 2005 bombing, which killed Hariri and 21 others.
“We hope that all those who committed crimes against the Lebanese will be held accountable, and that fair trials will be held for those who committed crimes against the Syrian people,” Jumblatt said.
Iran’s leader predicts trouble for new Syrian rulers
Separately, Iran’s supreme leader said that young Syrians will resist the new government emerging after Assad’s overthrow as he again accused the United States and Israel of sowing chaos in the country.
Iran had provided crucial support to Assad throughout Syria’s nearly 14-year civil war, which erupted after he launched a violent crackdown on a popular uprising. Syria had long served as a key conduit for Iranian aid to Hezbollah.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in an address on Sunday that the “young Syrian has nothing to lose” and suffers from insecurity following Assad’s fall.
“What can he do? He should stand with strong will against those who designed and those who implemented the insecurity,” Khamenei said. “God willing, he will overcome them.”
He accused the United States and Israel of plotting against Assad’s government in order to seize resources, saying: “Now they feel victory, the Americans, the Zionist regime and those who accompanied them.”
Iran and its militant allies in the region have suffered a series of major setbacks over the past year, with Israel battering Hamas in Gaza and landing heavy blows on Hezbollah before they agreed to a ceasefire in Lebanon last month.
Khamenei denied that such groups were proxies of Iran, saying they fought because of their own beliefs and that the Islamic Republic did not depend on them. “If one day we plan to take action, we do not need proxy force,” he said.
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Associated Press writer Nasser Karimi in Tehran, Iran, contributed to this report.
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