What Lifting Of US Sanctions Mean For War-Torn Syria

US President Donald Trump's announcement from Saudi Arabia about the United States easing wide-ranging sanctions on Syria sparked festivities in the capital, Damascus, as Syrians hoped for relief after years of impoverishment by civil war and restrictions. Syrian interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa welcomed Trump's "courageous" move and said now his government can "begin the real work, with which modern Syria will be reborn."

Speaking in a television address, al-Sharaa said the American Presidnet's decision "was a historic and courageous decision, which alleviates the suffering of the people, contributes to their rebirth and lays the foundations for stability in the region".

The sanctions were widely seen as a major obstacle to Syria's economic recovery and post-war reconstruction, and their lifting can bring much-needed investment to the country emerging from decades of autocratic rule by the Assad family, as well as the war, which left an estimated 90 per cent of its population in poverty. 

After the announcement, videos from Damascus emerged on social media, showing hundreds of men, women, and children gathered at Umayyad Square, with music blasting in the background. While some people were seen dancing and waving Syrian flags, others drove by in their cars, with an anticipation of a better life palpable in their celebrations.

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"Now, we are not going to have any excuse by the government that there are sanctions that prevent doing this or that," Jihad Yazigi, founder and editor of the Syria Report, told the Washington Post. 

Hazem al-Loda, 31, a taxi driver who worked long hours to put food on the table, said that though US sanctions were meant to target the Assad regime, it was people who suffered the most. 

"The government didn't suffer. The rich found ways around it. We saw their fancy cars driving the streets in front of us, while we couldn't afford anything made after 2011," he told the Post. 

Sanctions On Syria And Trump's Announcement

The US has imposed three sanctions programs on Syria. In 1979, the country was designated a "state sponsor of terrorism" because its military was sound of being involved in neighbouring Lebanon's civil war and had backed armed groups there. In 2003, then-President George W Bush signed the Syria Accountability Act into law, which focused heavily on Syria's support of designated terror groups, its military presence in Lebanon, its alleged development of weapons of mass destruction, as well as oil smuggling and the backing of armed groups in Iraq after the US-led invasion.

In 2019, during Trump's first term, he signed the Caesar Act, sanctioning Syrian troops and others responsible for atrocities committed during the civil war that started in 2011 and left more than half a million dead, displaced millions.

Coupled with similar measures by other countries, the sanctions have touched every part of the Syrian economy and everyday life in the country. They have led to shortages of goods from fuel to medicine, and made it difficult for humanitarian agencies responding to receive funding and operate fully. Companies around the world struggle to export to Syria, and Syrians struggle to import goods of any kind because nearly all financial transactions with the country are banned. That has led to a blossoming black market of smuggled goods.

During his Riyadh visit this week, Trump offered to lift sanctions on Syria, mostly imposed during the repressive rule of ousted president Bashar al-Assad. The move comes as a major boost to the war-ravaged country, still getting to grips with Sharaa's December toppling of Assad. Trump however gave no indication that the United States would remove Syria from its blacklist of state sponsors of terrorism -- a designation dating back to 1979 over support to Palestinian militants that severely impedes investment.

What Lifting Of Sanctions Mean For Syria?

After Trump's announcement, Syria's currency gained 60 per cent on Tuesday night - a signal of how transformational the removal of sanctions could be. Still, experts believe it will take time to see any tangible impact on Syria's economy.

Per an Associated Press report, removal of all three sanctions could mean banks could return to the international financial system or car repair shops could import spare parts from abroad. If the economy improves and reconstruction projects take off, many Syrian refugees who live in crowded tented encampments relying on aid to survive, could decide to return home.

"If the situation stabilised and there were reforms, we would then see Syrians returning to their country if they were given opportunities, as we expect," Lebanese economist Mounis Younes told AP.

The easing of sanctions also has an important symbolic weight because it would signal that Syria is no longer a pariah, said President al-Shaar.

"Unless enough layers of sanctions are peeled off, you cannot expect the positive impacts on Syria to start to appear," said al-Shaar. "Even if you remove some of the top ones, the impact economically would still be nonexistent."

(With inputs from AP and AFP)