After nine years, the Syrian civil war remains unsolved and the ceasefire in the Idlib’s province agreed between Russia and Turkey in March appears extremely precarious. Here, the security situation is continuously threatened by new escalations, while the fate of 3 million internally displaced people packed in the area has become increasingly uncertain. To make things worse, the COVID-19 global health crisis risks to further ravage those most vulnerable as medical infrastructure in the country has been decimated after years of indiscriminate bombings, and the conditions in northwest Syria’s refugee camps make it impossible to implement proper social distancing measures. At the same time, deep fractures have recently emerged within the Assad Regime, casting further doubts on its political stability and the future configuration of the country, which remains deeply intertwined with the interests and roles played by a plethora of external actors.

Panel Discussion

Chair

Valeria Talbot, Senior Research Fellow and Co-Head, Middle East and North Africa Program, ISPI

Julien Barnes-Dacey, Director, Middle East & North Africa Programme, the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR)

Dareen Khalifa, Senior Analyst, Syria, International Crisis Group (ICG)

Andrey Kortunov, Director General, Russian International Affairs Council (RIAC)