JERUSALEM: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is pressing ahead with efforts to unify West Asian nations in support of a peaceful political transition in Syria.
He is meeting, on Friday, with Turkiye’s foreign minister after talks with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to try to bring Turkiye into a consensus to prevent Syria from collapsing into wider turmoil. It’s Blinken’s 12th trip to the region since the Israel-Hamas war erupted in Gaza.
The outgoing Biden administration is particularly concerned that a power vacuum in Syria could exacerbate already heightened tensions in the region and create conditions for the Islamic State group to regain territory.