Khaberni - Syrian Foreign Minister Assad Al-Sheibani said on Saturday that the ongoing talks with Israel about a security agreement do not include the Golan Heights and are limited to the areas that Israel occupied after the overthrow of the previous regime in Damascus.
After opposition factions ousted President Bashar al-Assad on December 8, 2024, Israel launched hundreds of airstrikes on Syrian military sites, and its forces advanced to positions in the buffer zone in the Golan Heights established by the 1974 disengagement agreement.
Israel and the new Syrian authorities held rounds of talks in recent months. Under American pressure in January, the two sides agreed to establish a joint coordination mechanism, paving the way for a security agreement between the two countries, which are officially in a state of war for decades.
Al-Sheibani stated during a session at the Munich Security Conference that the discussion focuses on "Israel's withdrawal" from the lands it occupied after the downfall of Assad, whereas the Golan Heights "is another issue".
He emphasized the necessity of Israel's withdrawal from the recently occupied territories to reach a security agreement.
He added "These negotiations will certainly not lead to accepting the status quo that Israel imposed in southern Syria," and will end with "Israel's withdrawal from the areas it advanced to after December 8, stopping Israel's interference in Syria's internal affairs, no violation of airspace, and no interference in Syrian sovereignty."
Al-Sheibani held a meeting on Friday with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio in Munich to discuss the recent agreement between Damascus and the Kurds, attended by the commander of the Syrian Democratic Forces ("SDF") Mazloum Abdi.
Last month, the two sides agreed to integrate the civil and military institutions of the Kurdish autonomous administration into the Syrian state, after weeks of clashes during which Damascus extended its control over large areas in northern and eastern Syria.
Al-Sheibani stated at the Munich conference that the meeting with Rubio and Abdi confirms "the new mentality that Syria is adopting today".
He continued, "We do not view our nation's partners as enemies; there may be details we do not agree on, but the unifying Syrian identity is a national identity and also an identity completed by Syrian diversity."
Further, Al-Sheibani expressed Damascus's willingness in the future to recover Syrian prisoners from ISIS to alleviate the burden on Iraq.
Washington announced on Friday that it had completed the transfer of thousands of prisoners suspected of belonging to the organization from Syria to Iraq, including many Syrians.
