Senior British diplomats meet with head of HTS militant group in Syria
A group of diplomats from the United Kingdom have held talks with the head of the Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) militant group, which ousted former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government earlier this month, amid widespread reports of Western and Israeli support.
Photographs released by HTS's military operations department showed the militant group’s chief Mohammed al-Golani's meeting with senior British officials in the capital, Damascus, on Monday.
Among those pictured with al-Golani was Ann Snow, the UK's special envoy to Syria.
According to HTS, the British delegation on Monday had discussed “the latest developments” in the Arab country.
The development comes as British Foreign Secretary David Lammy has already confirmed that London had initiated “diplomatic contact” with HTS, a group classified as a terrorist organization by the UK.
“Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham remains a banned terrorist organization in the UK, but we can have diplomatic contacts with it, so we have contacts aimed specifically at ensuring the establishment of a representative government and securing chemical weapons stockpiles in Syria,” he told British media on Sunday.
The meeting on Monday came after the British foreign secretary confirmed that a delegation had been sent for talks with interim Syrian authorities and civil society groups after the fall of Assad’s government earlier this month.
The British delegation “underlines our commitment to Syria,” Lammy stressed on Monday, claiming that the UK would support an “inclusive transitional political process that is Syrian-led and Syrian owned.”
Al-Golani has already pleaded with the West to lift its sanctions against Syria, and also dismissed the United States, the UK, and others’ designation of his group as a “terrorist organization,” alleging that HTS “did military activities."
He is the founder of the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda and the former deputy commander of the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group.
The HTS-led militants launched a surprise two-pronged attack on Syria’s northwestern city of Aleppo and the countryside around Idlib on November 27.
They marched southward to seize control of several major cities, including Hama, Homs, Dara’a, and Suwayda, before entering and capturing Damascus early on December 8.
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