Bashar al-Assad’s internal and international isolation is likely to continue despite some Western and Arab countries seeking to restore relations with him. Assad continues to rely on the Captagon trade to maintain his limited influence away from the influence of the many powers that share power with him in Syria, hoping that the world will accept his rule over time, according to a report by The Economist.
The newspaper report says that the Syrian regime is suffering from a continuous erosion in its ability to govern, and the Syrian “dictator” lives in isolation, hoping and believing that if he remains in power, the fears of his international opponents about the influence of Iran and another refugee crisis may push them to abandon their demands for political change and restore relations with Syria.
This strategy has already been supported. Last year, the Arab League restored Assad’s membership and began sending aid. In July, eight European Union countries proposed reaching out to Assad. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is seeking to restore relations with Assad and stimulate Syria’s economy to persuade Syrian refugees to return.
Continuous disintegration
The Syrian Interim Government sees itself as a political alternative to post-Assad Syria, running a 40km-long area south of the Turkish border where living conditions are relatively stable and conditions are better than in the rest of the country. But Turkey, which maintains 30,000 troops in northern Syria, prefers to use the interim government as a tool, according to the Economist report.
The regime has lost control of the airspace and borders, and Russia, Iran and Hezbollah are exploiting the situation “as if the country were their own,” while Shiite militias from Iraq and Lebanon dominate the border areas, and Hezbollah is using Syria as a base to launch missiles toward Israel, according to the report.
The north, which contains half of the country’s 16 million people, has been out of his control for eight years, with Sunni factions controlling the northwest, while the Kurds, with American support, rule the northeast.
“Captagon is the lion’s lifeline”
In this situation, as the newspaper report says, the Captagon trade has become a fundamental element in Assad’s survival strategy, as he monopolizes the drug trade in light of the “collapse of the state” and its economy, and drug exports are worth twice the value of all legal exports combined, according to the World Bank.
The newspaper report indicates that the revenues from Captagon go to Assad, not to the state, and the drug trade allows him to bypass international sanctions and obtain the funds needed to consolidate his rule without relying on international aid or foreign investment. This helps him maintain a wide network of influence and loyalties inside Syria and contributes to the deterioration of the country’s economy.
However, the report says these are ineffective strategies, especially in the face of a collapsing economy and the entrenchment of some other countries in Syria.
