Refugees, fight against drugs: enhanced cooperation between Syria and its Iraqi ally

Invitation to visit Damascus, fight against terrorism and drugs: for his first visit to Baghdad since Syria's return to the Arab League, the head of Syrian diplomacy on Sunday highlighted "cooperation" with the Iraqi ally.

Faisal Meqdad's trip to Iraq comes at a time when Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is gradually shedding his persona non grata status and returning to the regional scene after more than a decade of isolation.

Since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in 2003, Baghdad has supported the Syrian regime and abstained in the vote that led to its suspension from the Arab League in 2011. The measure was taken because of the suppression of the popular uprising which then degenerated into a bloody war.

Damascus' return to the Arab League was formalized on May 7 and Iraq was "one of the initiators," Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein said at a press conference with his Syrian counterpart.

The Syrian then conveyed to Iraqi Prime Minister Mohamed Chia al-Sudani an "invitation to visit Damascus" on a date that was not specified, according to a statement from the office of the head of government.

Question of refugees

With his Iraqi counterpart, Faisal Meqdad discussed the issue of Syrian refugees who have left their country because of the war, fleeing to neighboring countries: Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq, in particular. "We have received about 250,000 refugees, most of whom are in camps in Iraqi Kurdistan," Hussein said.

The next step, he said, "will be humanitarian aid and how to get it to Syria," where the February 6 earthquake killed more than 6000,<> people, especially in rebel-held areas in the north and northwest of the country, which is still fragmented by war.

Thanking Iraq for its "solidarity" after the earthquake, Faisal Meqdad welcomed the "progress" in bilateral relations. "We will continue to cooperate to combat terrorism and eliminate the danger posed by drugs," he added.

Iraq and Syria share a 600 km border in the middle of the desert, which facilitates the circulation of Islamic State (IS) cells and drug trafficking. In March, Iraqi border guards announced the seizure at the Syrian border of more than three million tablets of captagon, a drug of the amphetamine family whose trafficking has exploded in recent years in the Middle East.

Through this porous border ISIS cells also pass. The jihadists continue to launch sporadic attacks against Iraqi security forces. IS seized entire territories in 2014 in both countries to exercise its reign of terror, before being defeated in 2017 in Iraq and in 2019 in Syria under successive offensives.