The lifting of economic sanctions on Syria will allow the government to begin work on daunting tasks that include fighting corruption and bringing millions of refugees home, Hind Kabawat, the minister of social affairs and labor, told The Associated Press on Friday.
Ms. Kabawat is the only woman and the only Christian in the 23-member cabinet formed in March to steer the country during a transitional period after the ouster of former President Bashar Assad in a rebel offensive in December. Her portfolio will be one of the most important as the country begins rebuilding after nearly 14 years of civil war.
She said moves by the United States and the European Union in the past week to at least temporarily lift most of the sanctions that had been imposed on Syria over decades will allow that work to get started.
Before, she said, “we would talk, we would make plans, but nothing could happen on the ground because sanctions were holding everything up and restricting our work.” With the lifting of sanctions they can now move to “implementation.”
One of the first programs the new government is planning to launch is “temporary schools” for the children of refugees and internally displaced people returning to their home areas.
Ms. Kabawat said that it will take time for the easing of sanctions to show effects on the ground, particularly since unwinding some of the financial restrictions will involve complicated bureaucracy.
“We are going step by step,” she said. “We are not saying that anything is easy – we have many challenges – but we can’t be pessimistic. We need to be optimistic.”
The new government’s vision is “that we don’t want either food baskets or tents after five years,” Ms. Kabawat said, referring to the country’s dependence on humanitarian aid and many displacement camps.
That may be an ambitious target, given that 90% of the country’s population currently lives below the poverty line, according to the United Nations.
The civil war that began in 2011 also displaced half the country’s pre-war population of 23 million people. The U.N.’s refugee agency, UNHCR, estimates that about half a million have returned to Syria since Mr. Assad was ousted. But the dire economic situation and battered infrastructure have also dissuaded many refugees from coming back.
The widespread poverty also fed into a culture of public corruption that developed in the Assad era, including solicitation of bribes by public employees, and shakedowns by security forces at checkpoints.
Syria’s new rulers have pledged to end the corruption, but they face an uphill battle. Public employees make salaries far below the cost of living, and the new government has so far been unable to make good on a promise to hike public sector wages by 400%.
“How can I fight corruption if the monthly salary is $40 and that is not enough to buy food for 10 days?” Ms. Kabawat asked.
Women and minorities
The country’s new rulers, led by President Ahmad al-Sharaa – the former head of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS, a Sunni Islamist insurgent group that spearheaded the offensive against Mr. Assad – have been under scrutiny by western countries over the treatment of Syrian women and religious minorities.
In March, clashes between government security forces and pro-Assad armed groups spiraled into sectarian revenge attacks on members of the Alawite sect to which Mr. Assad belongs. Hundreds of civilians were killed.
The government formed a committee to investigate the attacks, which has not yet reported its findings.
Many also criticized the transitional government as giving only token representation to women and minorities. Apart from Ms. Kabawat, the cabinet includes only one member each from the Druze and Alawite sects, and one Kurd.
“Everywhere I travel … the first and last question is, ‘What is the situation of the minorities?’” Ms. Kabawat said. “I can understand the worries of the West about the minorities, but they should also be worried about Syrian men and women as a whole.”
She said the international community’s priority should be to help Syria to build its economy and avoid the country falling into “chaos.”
Time to rebuild
Despite being the only woman in the cabinet, Ms. Kabawat said “now there is a greater opportunity for women” than under Mr. Assad and that “today there is no committee being formed that does not have women in it.”
“Syrian women have suffered a lot in these 14 years and worked in all areas,” she said. “All Syrian men and women need to have a role in rebuilding our institutions.”
She called for those wary of Mr. al-Sharaa to give him a chance.
While the West has warmed to the new president – particularly after his recent high-profile meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump – others have not forgotten that he fought against U.S. forces in Iraq after the invasion of 2003 or that his HTS group was formed as an offshoot of Al Qaeda, although it later cut ties.
“People used to call [Nelson] Mandela a terrorist, and then he became the first leader among those who freed South Africa, and after that suddenly he was no longer a terrorist,” Ms. Kabawat said. She urged skeptics to “give us the same chance that you gave to South Africa.”
This story was reported by The Associated Press.
