Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at a dinner for NATO members at the White House, July 10, 2024, in Washington. (Credit: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images/AFP)
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Saturday he “hopes” that Syria, where rebels are seeking to overthrow Bashar al-Assad's regime, will “find the peace it has been dreaming of for 13 years” since the start of the bloody uprising.
“Our wish is that our neighbor, Syria, will find the peace and tranquility it has been dreaming of for 13 years,” said the Turkish head of state, adding that Syria is "tired of war, blood and tears." “Our Syrian brothers and sisters deserve freedom, security and peace in their homeland,”said Erdogan, adding that he hoped "to see a Syria where different identities live together peacefully."
“We hope to see such a Syria in the very near future,” he launched during a speech in the southeastern city of Gaziantep, where several hundred thousand Syrian refugees have sought refuge since the start of the civil war in 2011.
“There is now a new political and diplomatic reality in Syria,” he added, accusing Damascus of failing to grasp "the hand extended by Turkey," which in recent months had sought a rapprochement with the Syrian regime, in particular to allow the return of some of the three million Syrian refugees on Turkish soil.