Syria’s Assad takes oath after re-election

President Bashar al-Assad took the oath of office for a fourth term in war-ravaged Syria yesterday, after officially winning 95% of the vote in an election dismissed abroad.

It was the second presidential poll since the start of a decade-long civil war that has killed almost half a million people and battered the country’s infrastructure.

Shortly before the ceremony, rockets fired by pro-government forces killed six people including three children and a rescue worker in the country’s last major rebel bastion of Idlib, the Syrian Observatory for Human

Rights said. An AFP correspondent in the village of Sarja saw men work hurriedly to remove bodies from the rubble of a collapsed home, before carrying one away in a red blanket.

Assad, 55, was sworn in in the presence of more than 600 guests, including ministers, businessmen, academics and journalists, organisers said.

Syria’s war has displaced millions of people since starting in 2011 with the repression of antigovernment protests.

After a series of victories against militants with key backing from allies Russia and others, government forces today control two-thirds of Syria.

Syria’s former Al Qaeda affiliate runs the opposition bastion of Idlib in the northwest, where rebels are also present.

A Turkish-Russian ceasefire has largely held in Idlib since March 2020, after halting the latest deadly government offensive on the region of some three mn people.

But violations of that truce have increased in the south of the bastion in recent weeks, the Britain-based Observatory says.

Kurdish-led forces control much of the oil-rich east after expelling the Islamic State group from the region with US backing.

Assad takes his oath as the country faces a dire economic crisis. More than 80% of the population live in poverty, and the Syrian pound has plunged in value against the dollar, causing skyrocketing inflation.

In recent weeks, the government has hiked the price of petrol, bread, sugar and rice, while power cuts can last up to 20 hours a day amid fuel shortages.

Nationwide, 12.4mn people struggle to find enough food each day, the World Food Programme says.

The Damascus government has blamed the country’s economic woes on Western sanctions and a deepening crisis in neighbouring Lebanon.

Banks in Lebanon have for more than a year forbidden depositors from withdrawing their dollar savings, affecting Syrian clients.

“The biggest obstacle now is the Syrian funds frozen in Lebanese banks,” said Assad.