Syria’s interim president Ahmed al-Sharaa will arrive in Turkey on Tuesday for his second international trip since the overthrow of Bashar al-Assad in December, the Turkish Presidency said on Feb. 3. He travelled to Saudi Arabia on Sunday as war-ravaged Syria looks to affluent Gulf countries to finance reconstruction and revive its economy.
“Sharaa will pay a visit to Ankara on Tuesday at the invitation of our President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan,” Fahrettin Altun, Turkey’s head of communications, said on X on Monday.
Turkey, which has maintained close ties with Sharaa, reopened its diplomatic mission in Syria and dispatched its intelligence chief and foreign minister for talks with the interim leader soon after Assad was toppled by the Islamist-rooted Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group.
Talks between Erdoğan and Sharaa at the presidential palace in Ankara will focus on “joint steps to be taken for economic recovery, sustainable stability and security” in Syria, according to Altun. “We believe that Turkey-Syria relations, re-established after Syria regained its freedom, will be strengthened and gain new dimensions,” he added.
In a parallel development reflecting broader regional and global interest in the shifting power dynamics, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is scheduled to meet with U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday as well.
