Trump administration revokes foreign terrorist designation for Syria's HTS

Washington's move follows the lifting of sanctions on Damascus after the ouster of the al-Assad government in December in a rebel offensive.

The Trump administration has revoked the foreign terrorist organisation designation of Syria's Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), as part of a broader US engagement with the transitional government since the ouster of former leader Bashar al-Assad late last year.US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the move, which takes effect on Tuesday, "recognizes the positive actions taken by the new Syrian government" under its President Ahmad al-Sharaa. "This FTO revocation is an important step in fulfilling President Trump’s vision of a stable, unified, and peaceful Syria," Rubio said.The decision was made a fortnight ago, with Washington having taken several steps to ease or end many US sanctions that had been imposed during al-Assad’s rule. The removal of the terrorism designation looks to end Syria's isolation since an HTS-led lightning rebel offensive ousted the al-Assad family from decades of rule, and give the new government a boost as it tries to rebuild a nation shattered by 13 years of civil war.Speaking on Monday before having dinner with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House, US President Donald Trump repeated that he had previously been told that Syria's new leader "comes from a very tough background"."I said: 'Well, you know, I’m not that surprised. It’s a tough part of the world,'" said Trump, who met with al-Sharaa in Saudi Arabia in May. "But I was very impressed by him. But we took the sanctions off because we want to give them a chance."Last month, Trump inked an executive order ending many US economic sanctions on Syria, following through on a promise he made to al-Sharaa when they met. Syria has been improving relations with the US and other Western nations since al-Assad's ouster.The order did not rescind sanctions imposed on al-Assad, his top aides, relatives and officials who had been determined to have committed human rights abuses or been involved in drug trafficking or part of Syria's chemical weapons programme.It also leaves intact a major set of sanctions passed by US Congress targeting anyone doing business with or supporting Syria's military, intelligence or other suspect institutions.'Positive step'HTS was previously known as al-Nusra Front when it was al-Qaeda's Syria branch. Al-Nusra was initially designated a foreign terrorist organisation by the US for its affiliation with al-Qaeda, at a time when al-Sharaa went under a nom de guerre, Abu Mohammad al-Julani.In 2016, al-Sharaa's group split and changed its name to Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, which the first Trump administration added to the initial terrorism designation in 2018. In a statement, Syria's foreign ministry said the revocation was a "positive step toward correcting a course that previously hindered constructive engagement".The ministry said it hoped that the delisting of HTS would "contribute to the removal of remaining restrictions that continue to impact Syrian institutions and officials, and open the door to a rational, sovereign-based approach to international cooperation".Al-Sharaa is reportedly planning to attend the upcoming UN General Assembly in New York in September. The UN Security Council (UNSC) still has sanctions in place on HTS and al-Sharaa individually, which can only be removed by the Council itself. Russia, which is a permanent member of the UNSC, and its President Vladimir Putin are longtime backers of former dictator al-Assad, who remains in exile in Moscow.