U.S. President Donald Trump met Wednesday with Syria’s interim President Ahmad al-Sharaa, the first such encounter between the two nations’ leaders in 25 years.
The meeting, on the sidelines of Trump sitting with the leaders of the Gulf Cooperation Council, marks a major turn of events for a Syria still adjusting to life after the over 50-year, iron-gripped rule of the Assad family.
It’s also remarkable given al-Sharaa, who under the nom de guerre Abu Mohammed al-Golani, had once battled U.S. forces in Iraq before entering the Syrian war.
Trump on Tuesday announced the meeting, saying the U.S. also would move to lift economic sanctions on Syria as well.
Syria even before its ruinous civil war that began in 2011 struggled under a tightly controlled socialist economy and under sanctions by the U.S. as being a state-sponsor of terror since 1979.
