Syria expected to hold parliamentary election in September
Voting for the 210-member People's Assembly is scheduled to take place between September 15 and 20, said Mohamed Taha, who is overseeing the electoral process.
President Ahmed al-Sharaa has received a draft electoral law that amends a previous decree and raises the number of seats from 150 to 210. A third of the seats will be appointed by the president.
The government has pledged broad representation and said it will allow foreign observers to monitor electoral committees overseeing the vote.
Officials said areas outside government control, including Kurdish-held regions in northern Syria and the Druze-majority province of Sweida, would continue to have seats allocated based on population.
The new assembly is expected to lay the groundwork for a broader democratic process, which critics say currently lacks sufficient participation from minority groups.
It will also be tasked with approving landmark legislation aimed at overhauling decades of state-controlled economic policies and ratifying treaties that could reshape Syria's foreign policy alliances.
In March, Syria issued a constitutional declaration to guide the interim period under Sharaa's leadership. The document preserves a central role for Islamic law while guaranteeing women's rights and freedom of expression.
It raised concerns of civic groups and Western nations about the concentration of power among the country's Islamist-led leadership.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Times
19 minutes ago
- Times
Israel challenges UN to deliver more food to Gaza
Israel challenged the United Nations on Sunday to carry out its pledge to deliver more food to the starving people of Gaza after announcing a U-turn in its aid policy. After two months of restricting UN aid convoys in favour of the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, the Israel Defence Forces said they were implementing new 'humanitarian pauses' in fighting to allow in more UN aid. They stopped daytime military operations in three locations: Gaza city, Deir al-Balah and Muwasi. In addition they set up 'secure routes to enable the safe passage of UN and humanitarian aid organisation convoys delivering and distributing food and medicine to the population across the Gaza Strip'. They also allowed three Jordanian and Emirati supply planes to drop aid supplies into the strip, though the quantity delivered, 25 tonnes, is a fraction of what the UN can deliver on the ground. The World Food Programme (WFP) said that it distributed 4,200 tonnes last week, even before Israel eased restrictions. Israel also staged its own air drops. Israeli ministers have alternated between denying the existence of famine conditions in Gaza, despite the mounting numbers of images of emaciated children, and blaming Hamas. On Sunday Binyamin Netanyahu, the prime minister, gave an ambiguous interpretation of whether the IDF's reversal amounted to a concession to international pressure, including from Britain and other western governments. 'Whichever path we choose, we will have to continue to allow the entry of minimal humanitarian supplies,' Netanyahu said. Speaking from the Ramon air base in the Negev desert, he added: 'There are secured convoys. There have been all along, but today it is official. There will be no more excuses.' In line with warnings from aid officials, the first convoys seen to enter Gaza under the new regimen, including from Egypt for the first time in months, were mobbed by desperate crowds. Apart from the aid situation, the prospect of a ceasefire will be high on the agenda when President Trump meets Sir Keir Starmer on Monday, especially after the announcement by President Macron of France on Friday that he intended to recognise Palestinian statehood. Starmer has so far resisted pressure to follow suit but ministers were keen to show they were paying attention to growing concern about Gaza by focusing on aid. David Lammy, the foreign secretary, reiterated promises to join the Israeli air drop scheme but also insisted that ground convoys were the only way to get enough food into Gaza to feed its people. 'Access to aid must be urgently accelerated over the coming hours and days,' he said. 'Whilst airdrops will help to alleviate the worst of the suffering, land routes serve as the only viable and sustainable means of providing aid into Gaza. These measures must be fully implemented and further barriers on aid removed. The world is watching.' Although aid agencies say that only a ceasefire will allow Gaza to obtain all the aid it needs, they welcomed the easing of restrictions yesterday. 'We have enough food in, or on its way to, the region to feed the entire population of 2.1 million people for almost three months,' the World Food Programme said. 'These new commitments to improve operating conditions come on top of earlier assurances from Israel to strengthen facilitation of humanitarian assistance.' UN emergency relief coordinator Tom Fletcher said aid restrictions appeared to have eased by Sunday evening, citing initial reports indicating that over 100 truckloads of aid were collected. He warned in a statement, however, that 'sustained action' was needed to 'stave off famine and a catastrophic health crisis'. In Israel, a boat attempting to bring a symbolic amount of aid into the territory was brought into the port of Ashod, along with its 21 crew members from the Pro-Palestinian Freedom Flotilla Coalition activist group – including two French parliamentarians and two Al Jazeera journalists. Israeli forces seized the vessel in international waters earlier in the weekend. In Gaza, six people died from malnutrition in 24 hours, the Hamas-run health ministry said on Sunday, with the World Health Organisation stating that the condition remained 'on a dangerous trajectory, marked by a spike in deaths in July'. AHMED JIHAD IBRAHIM AL-ARINI/ GETTY IMAGES It said it had recorded 63 deaths from malnutrition this month, including 24 children under five, one child over five, and 38 adults. That compared with a total of 11 deaths over the first six months of the year. Mervat Najm, 53, who has nine children, said she felt more secure, even if she had yet to receive more food herself. 'We woke up and for once we felt some psychological relief,' she said. 'But no organisation has contacted us. We're glued to our phones, trying to keep them charged, just in case we receive a message saying we can collect aid. 'We just want the aid to come in safely. A few days ago my 17-year-old son Abdel Rahman was carrying a bag of flour when someone pulled a knife on him and stole it.' A key marker of confidence is the price of food on what remains of the open market in Gaza. 'Just two days ago I bought a pack of pasta for 35 shekels (£7.75). Today, I found the same pack for 15 shekels,' said Doaa Masoud, a teacher and father of three who has been displaced to Muwasi. 'Traders are beginning to lower prices. Flour was selling for 100 shekels per kilo a few days ago. Today some sellers are offering it for 25 shekels. But for us, as displaced families, we're still living off promises, not real assistance.'
The Independent
an hour ago
- The Independent
Starmer to urge Trump to end the mass starvation in Gaza
Sir Keir Starmer will plead with Donald Trump to bring about a ceasefire in Gaza and end the suffering of thousands of Palestinians when he meets with the US president in Scotland on Monday. The growing crisis in the Middle East will top the agenda when the two hold their bilateral meeting at President Trump's Turnberry golf course in Ayrshire, with the prime minister under immense political pressure to change the UK's policy on recognising Palestine as a state. It comes after the IDF announced a 'tactical pause' in fighting to allow aid to get in, with thousands of people trapped in Gaza facing mass starvation. On Sunday, Jordan and the UAE carried out the first airdrops of food and essential supplies. A Downing Street source said that the prime minister and the president have a 'shared desire to bring an end to the barbaric war'. The meeting comes after a Sunday bilateral between Mr Trump and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen at Turnberry, where the two struck a trade deal to avoid a tariff war despite the US president having told reporters beforehand that he was 'not in a good mood'. It was put to Mr Trump that Sir Keir would ask him about a Middle East ceasefire, but he replied: 'We're meeting about a lot of things. We have our trade deal and it's been a great deal. 'It's good for us. It's good for them and good for us. I think the UK is very happy, they've been trying for 12 years to get it and they got it, and it's a great trade deal for both, works out very well. 'We'll be discussing that. I think we're going to be discussing a lot about Israel. They're very much involved in terms of wanting something to happen. [Starmer] is doing a very good job, by the way.' The mini-summit at Turnberry was intended primarily to focus on the continuing problem of steel tariffs imposed by President Trump, and other aspects of the trade deal the two signed last month. Sir Keir also wants to press the president on providing a backstop for the 'coalition of the willing' he is establishing with French president Emmanuel Macron to provide a guarantee of peace in Ukraine once the war with Russia comes to an end. But with harrowing pictures emerging over the past week of malnourished children in Gaza, alongside reports of the impact of starvation in the territory, the Middle East crisis has risen to the top of the agenda. Sir Keir is hoping that the strong personal relationship he has developed with the US president will help him in persuading Mr Trump to move on a number of these issues. The two will continue to talk when they travel together to Aberdeen for a further private dinner at Mr Trump's other Scottish golf course, which is dedicated to his mother. The president is looking for support to host an Open championship. Downing Street has insisted that 'the strength of the UK-US relationship will be on display again' as the prime minister meets President Trump for what it described as 'wide-ranging talks'. But the meeting is likely to be overshadowed by pressure on Sir Keir to join Mr Macron in officially recognising a Palestinian state. There was some speculation on Friday that the prime minister was close to doing so, after 221 MPs signed a cross-party letter supporting the move. Labour's biggest donors, the trade unions, have also collectively demanded action on recognising Palestine. Sir Keir used his strongest language yet on Friday when he described Israel's actions in Gaza as 'unspeakable and indefensible', adding that Palestinians have an 'inalienable right' to their own state. Pressure was further added by Mr Macron's announcement that France was preparing to recognise Palestine as a state, just ahead of an E3 phone call on Friday with Sir Keir and the German chancellor Friedrich Merz. But Sir Keir has held off taking similar action, with some suggesting that he wanted to see what President Trump would have to say about the crisis at their meeting at Turnberry before making a final decision. The problems kicked off further on Sunday, when Live Aid founder and former pop star Sir Bob Geldof clashed with Tory leader Kemi Badenoch on the topic of Israel and Gaza. The two appeared on Sir Trevor Phillips's Sunday morning show on Sky News. When asked about Israeli government claims that there are hundreds of trucks full of aid waiting to get into Gaza that are being held up by United Nations incompetence and Hamas, Sir Bob hit out at Benjamin Netanyahu and his government. 'The Israeli authorities are lying,' he claimed. 'They're lying. Netanyahu is a liar. The IDF are lying.' The comments enraged the Israeli government, which has denied being at fault after reports emerged that more than 110 people have died of hunger during the conflict. Israel has blamed Hamas for 'stealing aid and prolonging the war'. Israel's deputy foreign minister, Sharren Haskel, told The Independent: 'Bob Geldof says that 'we are way beyond' the attack by Hamas on Israel on 7 October 2023. This is complete rubbish. Hamas still holds 50 hostages in their dungeons of torture. They have been held for 660 days. I don't hear Bob Geldof calling for their release?' When Sir Bob's remarks were put to her by Sir Trevor, Ms Badenoch said he was wrong. She said: 'I disagree with that. What I'm seeing is Israel allowing humanitarian aid to go in. This has been an unbelievably difficult situation. It's been heartbreaking seeing some of the pictures, hearing those stories, and what we all want to see is this awful war coming to an end, and that will happen when those hostages are released. We need a ceasefire.' Polling by More in Common has shown that the British public side with Palestinians more than with Israel, by 29 per cent to 15 per cent.
Reuters
an hour ago
- Reuters
Yemen's Houthis threaten to target ships linked to firms dealing with Israeli ports
July 27 (Reuters) - Yemen's Houthis said on Sunday they would target any ships belonging to companies that do business with Israeli ports, regardless of their nationalities, as part of what they called the fourth phase of their military operations against Israel. In a televised statement, the Houthis' military spokesperson warned that ships would be attacked if companies ignored their warnings, regardless of their destination. "The Yemeni Armed Forces call on all countries, if they want to avoid this escalation, to pressure the enemy to halt its aggression and lift the blockade on the Gaza Strip," he added. Since Israel's war in Gaza began in October 2023, the Iran-aligned Houthis have been attacking ships they deem as bound or linked to Israel in what they say are acts of solidarity with Palestinians. In May, the U.S. announced a surprise deal with the Houthis where it agreed to stop a bombing campaign against them in return for an end to shipping attacks, though the Houthis said the deal did not include sparing Israel.
