It will be the first such delivery since the fall late last year of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime with which Armenia’s current and former governments maintained a cordial relationship.
A government statement said nothing about the volume and nature of the aid approved by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s cabinet during a weekly meeting in Yerevan. It will be shipped by land, the statement said, adding that Armenia will open the Margara border crossing with Turkey on Friday for a ten-day period.
The Armenian Foreign Ministry indicated later in the day that Turkey has already agreed to allow the transit of the planned shipment through its territory. The ministry spokeswoman, Ani Badalian, told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service that “the logistical issues of delivering humanitarian aid to Syria by land have been discussed and agreed upon with Turkey through diplomatic channels.” Ankara has kept the Turkish-Armenian border closed since the early 1990s.
The Armenian government has previously sent humanitarian aid to Syria by air. It most recently did so in the wake of a devastating 2023 earthquake in northern Syria and southeastern Turkey.
Yerevan was quick to establish contacts with Syria’s new, Turkish-backed government formed by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) Islamist militant group. A senior Armenian diplomat visited Damascus for that purpose in January.
The new Syrian leadership has assured Syria’s Armenian community and other minorities that their security and rights will be protected. Concerns for their future were reignited earlier this month by the reported killings of hundreds of civilians blamed on Syrian government forces.
According to an Aleppo-based Armenian-language newspaper, two Syrian Armenian residents of the coastal city of Latakia were among the victims. The Armenian Foreign Ministry effectively denied that, however.
Earlier this week, the Armenian consul general in Aleppo, Ara Avetisian, met with Azzam al-Gharib, the governor of the surrounding Syrian province. The Armenian consulate said Gharib “expressed hope that Syrian Armenians who left Syria due to dramatic events will return to their homes.”
An estimated 80,000 ethnic Armenians lived in Syria — and Aleppo in particular — before the outbreak of its civil war in 2011. At least half of them reportedly fled the country during the war. Thousands took refuge in Armenia.
