Turkey & Post-Assad Syria

Anadolu's City Economies Summit, hosted by Gaziantep Metropolitan Municipality on June 9, 2026, was announced to focus on reviving trade, logistics and production ties between Türkiye and Syria, twinning Gaziantep with Aleppo. Turkish Trade Minister Ömer Bolat and Syrian Economy and Industry Minister Mohammad Nidal al-Shaar were billed as speakers, alongside the governors of both Gaziantep and Aleppo and Anadolu CEO Serdar Karagöz. The headline proposal was a cross-border 'intermediate production ecosystem' built on specially regulated production-and-trade zones between the two cities. It frames reconstruction not as aid but as integrating Aleppo's industry into Turkey's supply chains.

Türkiye's UN permanent representative Ahmet Yıldız told the Security Council on June 4 that Syria's chemical-weapons dossier was 'one of the most tragic and disturbing legacies of the Assad era,' praising the al-Sharaa government's cooperation with OPCW inspectors in locating undeclared munitions, agents, equipment and documentation. He highlighted a 'Breath of Freedom' task force — Türkiye plus seven other nations — and urged reinstating Syria's rights under the Chemical Weapons Convention. Türkiye had hosted a task-force workshop in Ankara on Feb. 16–17 and pointed to the next meeting in The Hague. It positions Ankara as Damascus's sponsor and validator inside the multilateral system.

An Ankara Chief Prosecutor indictment released June 3 sought 35 years to life for Önder Sığırcıkoğlu, a former MIT officer accused of abducting two Free Syrian Army commanders — Hussein Harmoush and Mustafa Kassoum — in 2011 and handing them to the Assad regime, where Harmoush died under torture. Sığırcıkoğlu, captured on the Syrian–Lebanese border in a joint MIT–post-Baathist Syrian intelligence operation, was also charged with political espionage and with passing MIT information to Russian intelligence between 2014 and 2024 under Assad-regime protection. The indictment alleges FETÖ-linked suspects helped him escape an Osmaniye prison in 2014. The case turns Assad-era betrayals into a present-day prosecution co-run with Damascus.

Transport and Infrastructure Minister Abdulkadir Uraloğlu said on June 3 that Turkey plans to modernize the historic Hejaz Railway and extend it to Oman as a global trade alternative to the Strait of Hormuz. The initial stage connects Turkey to Aleppo via the existing Aleppo–Damascus–Jordan network while negotiations with Saudi authorities continue, with the final line reaching the Omani coast. Uraloğlu confirmed the design phase is complete for the separate 1,200km Iraq Development Road (Basra to the Turkish border, with UAE, Qatar, Iraq and Turkey funding), which 'awaits a calmer regional environment,' and that the Zangezur Corridor's Kars–Iğdır–Dilucu line tender was finalized. It puts engineering specifics under the corridor rhetoric.

Syria's interim president Ahmed al-Sharaa formally proposed the 'Four Seas' project at an emergency EU summit in Cyprus, positioning post-Assad Syria as a land-based transit hub linking the Mediterranean, Black, Caspian and Arabian seas as an alternative to the closed Strait of Hormuz and an insecure Red Sea. Per analysis carried by the events feed, Sharaa's 'zero problems' policy and neutrality in the Iran war had already drawn at least $28 billion in 2025 investment deals from Middle Eastern states, with US majors Chevron and ConocoPhillips signing on and Sharaa invited to a June 2026 G-7 summit. The pitch overlaps directly with Turkey's revived corridor plans, making Ankara and Damascus co-promoters of the same map.

Türkiye's MIT and Syrian intelligence services arrested 10 suspected ISIL (Daesh) members in a joint operation inside Syria on May 23, all wanted under Interpol Red Notices and brought to Türkiye for prosecution; nine were jailed pending trial. The detainees were Turkish nationals who had crossed into Syria to join Daesh, and included Ömer Deniz Dündar, linked via fingerprint evidence to perpetrators of the 2015 Ankara train-station bombing that killed 109 people. Others named were Ali Bora, an alleged Daesh intelligence figure for the group's 'Türkiye province,' and Hüseyin Peri of its health unit. It demonstrates an operational counter-terror partnership with the al-Sharaa security apparatus.

Presidents Erdoğan and Trump held a phone call on May 20, 2026, covering bilateral ties, regional stability and the upcoming NATO summit in Ankara. On Syria, Erdoğan stressed that lasting stability there would be 'an important gain for the entire region' and that Türkiye's support for Syria 'would continue uninterrupted,' while also urging against further deterioration in Lebanon and calling the extended Iran ceasefire 'a positive development.' Trump afterward told reporters at Joint Base Andrews the call was 'very good,' said 'I have a relationship with him that nobody else does,' and called Erdoğan 'a great ally.' It signals US deference to Turkey's lead on the Syria file.

More than 1.6 million Syrian refugees have returned to Syria since the late-2024 change of power, per UNHCR data cited by Welt am Sonntag, with the largest contingents from neighboring Turkey (634,000), Lebanon (621,000) and Jordan (284,000); Germany accounted for just 6,100. German Chancellor Merz had received al-Sharaa in March to discuss a return framework, with a denied '80%' target floated, while Foreign Minister Wadephul cast doubt on short-term mass returns after visiting the devastated town of Harasta ('hardly any people can live with dignity'). The figures quantify Turkey's stake: it hosted the largest Syrian population and is now the largest source of returns.

Türkiye approached the US and Lebanon with a proposal to help broker an arrangement involving Hezbollah, per sources cited by The Jerusalem Post, seeking an active mediator role; Washington gave no clear answer. The offer came amid a fragile Israel–Hezbollah ceasefire with ongoing violations and over a million displaced from southern Lebanon and Beirut, after Ankara delivered 360 tons of aid through the Port of Beirut. The report noted Türkiye had become a significant player in Syria under al-Sharaa even as Israel sought to block Turkish military bases there, and had earlier insisted any Iran deal also cover Lebanon. It shows Turkey leveraging its Syria position to claim a wider Levant broker role.

Turkey's MIT intelligence agency secretly demanded the prosecution of Sweden-based Turkish journalist Abdullah Bozkurt over an investigative article exposing its covert wartime ties to jihadist groups in Syria, triggering a criminal investigation and trial in absentia. A secret January 22, 2025 letter signed by MIT legal counsel on behalf of intelligence chief İbrahim Kalın complained that Bozkurt had detailed MIT's relationship with Anas Hasan Khattab — now director of Syria's General Intelligence Service, and a man designated by the US (2012) and UN (2014) over al-Qaeda links. The article said senior MIT officer Kemal Eskintan, alias 'Abu Furqan,' had handled Khattab. The case exposes the uncomfortable jihadi lineage beneath Ankara's Syria win.