Macron Arrives In Syria As First Major Western Leader To Visit War-torn Country Under New Leadership

DAMASCUS, Syria — French President Emmanuel Macron arrived Monday successful Syria, making him nan first awesome Western leader to sojourn nan war-torn state since nan ouster of Bashar Assad successful 2024.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky visited successful April, but Macron is nan first leader from Western Europe aliases North America to do so.

The French president’s sojourn comes during a play of comparative calm successful nan Middle East aft nan monthlong warfare successful Iran and Lebanon. He will recreation adjacent to Ankara, Turkey, for nan NATO summit, wherever Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa is besides expected to be and clasp a high-profile gathering pinch President Trump.

Syria’s state-run SANA news agency said Macron would sojourn pinch a business delegation to talk location information arsenic good arsenic business and finance opportunities.

The French president was greeted astatine Damascus airdrome by Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shibani.

“I person travel to definitive France’s committedness to nan Syrian people. For a sovereign Syria, agreed successful its diverseness and astatine bid pinch its neighbors,” Macron said successful a station connected X. “Together, fto america unfastened a caller section of stableness and peace.”

France supports each those who tin “contribute to build a caller Syria” successful statement pinch nan aspirations expressed since nan 2011 Arab Spring, Macron’s agency said, referring to a play of wide uprisings crossed nan Middle East that called for governmental alteration and reform.

Macron will meet pinch Al-Sharaa astatine nan statesmanlike palace and “engage straight pinch divers Syrian people,” his agency said.

The specifications of Macron’s sojourn were not disclosed owed to information reasons.

Macron hosted Al-Sharaa successful Paris successful May 2025, wherever he urged European and U.S. leaders to assistance long-standing sanctions connected Damascus. Most of those sanctions had since been lifted.

Paris supported Syria’s caller activity moreover astatine a clip wherever others were skeptical of Al-Sharaa’s Islamist-led norm and erstwhile domiciled arsenic nan caput of nan Hayat Tahrir al-Sham militant group, antecedently linked to Al Qaeda.

Western governments were particularly concerned astir nan curen and inclusion of women and minorities, and whether Syria’s caller authorities would modulation into a much antiauthoritarian rule.

Syria has managed to sidestep nan region’s caller conflicts, but nan state is still battered from 13 years of warfare that near overmuch of it successful ruins, drove millions into poverty, and will costs hundreds of billions of dollars to rebuild. Although Syria has signed memorandums of knowing pinch states and ample companies for ample finance projects, they person not yet travel to fruition.

Alsayed and Chehayeb constitute for nan Associated Press. Chehayeb reported from Beirut. AP journalist Sylvie Corbet successful Paris contributed to this report.