CAIRO (Dispatches) -- Arab League foreign ministers adopted a decision to readmit Syria after more than a decade of suspension on Sunday, a League spokesperson said, consolidating a regional push to normalize ties with President Bashar al-Assad.
The decision said Syria could resume its participation in Arab League meetings immediately, while calling for a resolution of the crisis resulting from war on Syria, including the flight of refugees to neighboring countries and drug smuggling across the region.
It was taken at a closed meeting of foreign ministers at the Arab League’s headquarters in Cairo, said Gamal Roshdy, spokesman for the Arab League’s secretary general.
“Government delegations from the Syrian Arab Republic will resume their participation in Arab League meetings” starting Sunday, said a unanimous decision by the group’s foreign ministers.
While Arab states including the United Arab Emirates have pushed for Syria and Assad’s rehabilitation, others, including Qatar, have remained opposed to full normalization without a political solution to the Syrian conflict.
Some have been keen to set conditions for Syria’s return, with Jordan’s foreign minister saying last week that the Arab League’s reacceptance of Syria would only be the start of “a very long and difficult and challenging process”.
Sunday’s decision said Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Lebanon, Egypt and the Arab League’s Secretary General would form a ministerial contact group to liaise with the Syrian government and seek “step-by-step” solutions to the crisis.
Practical steps included continuing efforts to facilitate the delivery of aid in Syria, according to a copy of the decision seen by Reuters.
President Assad can attend an Arab League summit later this month “if he wishes to”, Arab League Secretary-General Ahmed Aboul Gheit said.
Responding to a question over whether Assad could participate
at the summit in Saudi Arabia, Aboul Gheit told a news conference in Cairo: “If he wishes, because Syria, starting from this evening, is a full member of the Arab League, and from tomorrow morning they have the right to occupy any seat.”
“When the invitation is sent by the hosting country, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and if he wishes to participate, he will participate,” he added.
Syria’s membership of the Arab League was suspended in 2011 after a devastating war was launched on the country, and many Arab states pulled their envoys out of Damascus.
The last Arab League summit Assad attended was in 2010, while the opposition attended the pan-Arab group’s summit in Doha in 2013, sparking a furious reaction from Damascus.
Recently, Arab states have been trying to reach consensus on whether to invite Assad to an Arab League summit on May 19 in Riyadh to discuss the pace of normalizing ties and on what terms Syria could be allowed back.
Saudi Arabia long resisted restoring relations with Assad but said after its recent rapprochement with Iran - Syria’s key regional ally - that a new approach was needed with Damascus.
In March, Saudi state media said Riyadh and Damascus were in talks on resuming consular services, and in April, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan made the first visit to Damascus by an official from the kingdom since the start of the war.
That meeting came less than a week after Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad visited Saudi Arabia, also on the first such visit since the conflict began.
Mekdad has visited a string of Arab countries including in recent weeks in a diplomatic push, including to Algeria, Tunisia and Egypt.
On Monday, he attended talks in Amman with foreign ministers from Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Egypt to discuss the long-running conflict.
In April, nine Arab countries including Persian Gulf states meet in Saudi Arabia to discuss ending Syria’s long spell in the diplomatic wilderness and its possible return to the Arab League.
Syria called on Sunday for Arab states to show “mutual respect”. Arab states should pursue “an effective approach based on mutual respect”, the Syrian foreign ministry said in a statement that also stressed the “importance of joint work and dialogue to undertake the challenges facing Arab countries”.