UPDATE: SYRIANS FLOCK TO CELEBRATE NEW DAY AFTER OVERTHROW OF PRESIDENT BASHAR AL-ASSAD
Read Time:1 Minute, 49 Second
According to AFP journalists, Syrians gathered in the capital city of Damascus’ main square on Monday to celebrate what many see as a long-awaited new dawn following the overthrow of President Bashar al-Assad.
After his clan ruled Syria for fifty years, Assad fled to Russia on Sunday after an Islamist rebel-led lightning onslaught overthrew him and ushered in a new era.
After the rebels enforced a nighttime curfew on the capital, happy people poured onto Umayyad Square, where AFP journalists witnessed the deployment of fighters.
“It’s indescribable, we never thought this nightmare would end, we are reborn,” 49-year-old Rim Ramadan, a civil servant at the finance ministry, told AFP at the square in the heart of the capital.
“We were afraid for 55 years of speaking, even at home, we used to say the walls had ears,” Ramadan said, as people honked their car horns and rebels fired their guns into the air.
“We feel like we’re living a dream,” she added.
Another AFP reporter saw that certain neighbourhoods of the capital were empty.
A violent crackdown on democracy movements led to a 14-year civil war, which ended with Assad’s overthrow.
Over 500,000 individuals lost their lives in the conflict, and half of the population was displaced, with millions of them living overseas.
Anyone suspected of dissent may be imprisoned or killed under the regime that Assad inherited from his father, Hafez al-Assad.
Despite the widespread demonstrations and violent uprising, Assad was able to maintain power by relying on his connections with Russia and Iran.
READ ALSO:
(JUST-IN) WORLD NEWS: SOUTH KOREAN PRESIDENT BANNED FROM LEAVING COUNTRY
However, on November 27, a group of rebels under the leadership of the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham began an onslaught that swept throughout the nation, seizing control of city after city until they arrived in Damascus on Sunday.
Decades of Baath party rule came to an end when the army and security forces’ hold broke down in a matter of days, and rebels advanced into the cities of Aleppo, Hama, Daraa, and Homs before making their way into the capital.
AFP
Happy
0 %
Sad
0 %
Excited
0 %
Sleepy
0 %
Angry
0 %
Surprise
0 %
0
0