Assad to attend Arab League summit

BEIRUT: Syrian President Bashar Al Assad will atend this week his first Arab League summit in 13 years, his foreign minister said on Wednesday.

“He will come to attend this summit,” Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad told Lebanon’s Al Jadeed TV on Wednesday when asked about Assad’s attendance, speaking on the sidelines of a meeting of Arab foreign ministers in Jeddah.

The host of Friday’s summit, Saudi Arabia, has championed Assad’s return to the pan-arab body and invited the Syrian leader.

“The Jeddah summit is one of the most important summits for a long time,” said Saudi political commentator Suleiman Al Aqili.

“If the summit is able to reintegrate Syria into the Arab system and take a strong position on the conflict in Sudan and Yemen, it will be successful.”

Assad’s stay in Jeddah will be followed across the region, perhaps nowhere more closely than in Damascus.

“This is the first time in many years that my family and I have been interested in political news because we had lost hope,” said Haidar Hamdan, a 44-year-old geography teacher in the Syrian capital.

His country’s reintegration into the Arab League represents a “return to the world order,” he said, adding that he expected shutered embassies and companies to reopen and “movement and life (to) return to the country.”

Other Damascus residents have more subdued expectations.

“We are optimistic, but we know that the Arab summit is not a magic wand that can be waved to solve all of Syria’s problems,” said Sawsan, a 29-year-old who works at a car dealership.

Beyond rekindling ties with the Assad government, the summit is expected to devote energy to two conflicts - a month-long showdown between two generals in Sudan and the eight-year civil war in Yemen.

Last week in Jeddah, Sudan’s warring parties agreed to respect humanitarian principles, but they have made no breakthrough on a truce in talks that one US official called “very tough.”