Syria’s new rulers appoint the leader of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham as Minister of Defense, by Reuters

DAMASCUS (Reuters) – An official source said on Saturday that the new Syrian regime appointed Murhaf Abu Qasra, a prominent leader in the armed opposition that ousted Bashar al-Assad, as Minister of Defense in the interim government.

Abu Qasra, also known by the nom de guerre Abu al-Hassan 600, is a senior figure in the Islamist group Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, which led the campaign that ousted Assad this month. The source said that he led many military operations during the Syrian revolution.

Syria’s de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa discussed “the shape of the military establishment in the new Syria” during a meeting with armed factions on Saturday, Syrian news agency SANA reported.

Pictures published by SANA showed Abu Qasra during the meeting next to Al-Sharaa, nicknamed Abu Muhammad Al-Julani.

Prime Minister Mohammed al-Bashir said this week that the Defense Ministry would be restructured using former rebel factions and officers who defected from Assad’s army.

Al-Bashir, who previously led an administration affiliated with Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham in the northwestern Idlib province, said he would head a three-month transitional government. The new administration has not announced plans for what will happen next.

SANA said that the ruling General Command appointed Asaad Hassan Al-Shaibani as Minister of Foreign Affairs earlier today, Saturday. A source in the new administration told Reuters that this step “comes in response to the aspirations of the Syrian people to establish international relations that achieve peace and stability.”

The General Command said that Al-Shaibani, 37 years old, a graduate of Damascus University, had previously headed the political department in the rebel-affiliated Idlib government.

The Sharaa group was part of Al-Qaeda until it cut ties with it in 2016. It was confined to Idlib for years until it launched an offensive in late November, overrunning cities in western Syria and entering Damascus as the army dissolved.

This week, Al-Sharaa met with a number of international envoys. He said that his main focus is on reconstruction and economic development, and that he is not interested in entering into any new conflicts.

Syrian rebels took control of Damascus on December 8, forcing Assad to flee after more than 13 years of civil war and ending his family’s decades-long rule.

Washington classified Al-Sharaa as a terrorist in 2013, saying that Al-Qaeda in Iraq had commissioned him to overthrow Assad’s rule and impose Islamic law in Syria. US officials said on Friday that Washington would cancel a $10 million bounty on his head.

The war has claimed hundreds of thousands of lives, caused one of the largest refugee crises in modern times, left cities bombed and reduced to rubble and the economy devastated by global sanctions.