Bashar al-Assad survives an alleged poisoning attempt in Russia, SOHR says

Ousted Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad has allegedly survived a poisoning attempt, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said in a post on X on Wednesday, citing an anonymous source.

According to the Observatory’s report, the former president, who fled to Russia after a coalition of rebel forces overthrew his regime in a 10-day lightning offensive, was discharged from a hospital on Moscow's outskirts on Tuesday, and his condition was described as stable. 

The source added that “Assad was only allowed visits from his brother Maher al-Assad during his hospital stay, as well as former Presidential Affairs Secretary Mansour Azzam.”

The incident was not mentioned by Russian media, but several regional and international media outlets have shared the incident, citing the same source. This is not the first time that such an announcement has been made; however, this is the first time it has been reported by the SOHR. In January, British media outlet The Sun reported on a poisoning attempting against the Syrian dictator without citing the source.

Bachar al-Assad ruled Syria with an iron fist from 2000 and 2024, taking up the position of his father, Hafez al-Assad, who ruled the country from 1971. When protests broke out across the country in 2011, Assad cracked down on the Syrian population with a bloody repression. The revolution descended into a civil war that lasted 14 years and saw hundreds of thousands of people killed and tens of thousands more kidnapped or missing.

Assad is the subject of multiple judicial proceedings in various countries, notably in France. On Saturday, Syria’s judiciary issued an arrest warrant in absentia against the former president, as part of an investigation into the repression of protests, arbitrary arrests, and clashes in Daraa, the southwestern city where the anti-regime uprisings first began.