Syria’s new leaders must keep promises on rights, UN envoy says

As for Syria’s neighbours, Mr Pedersen said that Israel’s actions since the fall of Assad had been “highly irresponsible”.

Since the 1967 Middle East war, Israel has occupied and later annexed the area of southern Syria known as the Golan Heights. Most other states, other than the US, consider the Golan to be occupied land.

Israel’s current bombing campaign against Syrian military facilities and its occupation of more Syrian land in the Golan Heights demilitarised buffer zone and neighbouring areas were, Mr Pedersen said, “a danger to the future of Syria, and these activities need to stop immediately”.

“There is no reason that Israel should occupy new Syrian territory. The Golan is already occupied. They don’t need new land to be occupied. So what we need to see is that also Israel acts in a manner that don’t destabilise this very, very fragile transitional process,” he added.

Mr Pedersen is also concerned about the complex web of power in northern Syria.

Turkey has a well-established relationship with HTS. It has troops in the north-west, as well as a militia known as the Syrian National Army (SNA), made up of rebel factions that it backs.

Since Assad was overthrown, the SNA has attacked the other force in Syria’s north, a Kurdish-led militia alliance called the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) which is supported by the US.

Mr Pedersen said it was Turkey’s interests to follow certain key principles, along with other foreign powers.

“What is it that we all need to see in Syria now? We need to see stability. We need to see that there are not new population groups that are displaced. We need to see that people are not running away from Syria as refugees. We need to see that refugees are returning, that… internally displaced can be returning to their homes.”