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Syria in the Next Decade

Syria in the Next Decade: Fragility, Complexity, andUnpredictability
Yezid Sayigh

The regime of President Bashar al-Assad has survived the long civil war and multiple external
military interventions that have devastated Syria since 2011, but is struggling to win the peace. The
regime is responding to the challenge by attempting to reproduce much the same kind of approachthat it believes was successful in ensuring its survival so far. But it suffers an unprecedented levelof fragility, and the challenges facing it are more complex than ever. It appears to be locked in what
may be described as “post-war but no-peace,” and which could last for up to another decade, andeven beyond.
This situation poses a particularly acute dilemma for neighbouring countries, whose stability andsecurity are at risk of being continuously undermined by Syria’s no-war/no-peace conditions foryears to come. In addition to regional neighbours, the wider international community also facesa challenge in trying to devise appropriate policies for achieving and consolidating an eventual
peaceful transition in Syria. To take one example, officials of the European Union privately speakof a 25-year time-frame for their approach to Syria, in effect acknowledging their lack of levers to
influence the outcome or ensure a diplomatic settlement. Evolving dynamics and trends in Syria areso fluid in all domains – especially in security and the economy – that predicting trajectories andoutcomes has become more difficult now than at any time during the past eight years of major armed
conflict. But acquiring an analytical grasp of dynamics and trends in Syria is essential.

(1) Context
The Assad regime is struggling visibly to restore government authority in areas retaken from the
opposition, rebuild infrastructure and functioning markets, or reassert effective political and security
control. Neither the regime nor the council of ministers or any other government agency is able toformulate meaningful policies in any domain, whether economic, social, political, or even military.
Government directives change frequently and are often contradictory.
These problems are more than likely to continue over the long-term. Sanctions imposed byWestern governments and their refusal to release reconstruction aid, coupled with negative economic
trends throughout the Levant and the diminishing ability (or political will) of Gulf states to provide
significant assistance or investment, impose severe limits on Syria’s ability to access credit ormarkets even if it resolves the above handicaps. Neither of the Assad regime’s main foreign allies,̶ 97 ̶

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Russia and Iran, can compensate for these sources of capital. Indeed, they actively seek commercial
opportunities in Syria to recoup the costs of their past investment in supporting the regime. China
has provided diplomatic support and is a potential source of business investment, but although its
economic appetite in Syria is growing it has few actual investments and is highly unlikely to help fill
the funding gap.1
These conditions complicate regime efforts to reactivate economic activity or devise newcommercial ventures intended to increase state revenue, provide capital for either reconstruction or
investment, and stabilize local communities. This failure impedes its ability to replace the influenceof foreign actors that provide funding or goods, or to compensate the families of loyalist war deadand reintegrate militiamen. It is unable to displace Russia, Iran, or Turkey – whether in relation to theeconomy or to their support for various armed actors on the ground. This results in the persistenceof hybrid forms of governance over revenue generation and over security agencies and the armed
forces, including some affiliated to the government itself. If these trends persist, they will leave
the regime increasingly vulnerable internally. And yet its continued resort to favouring of crony
businessmen as a principal means of resuming economic activity and generating income presents realrisks of generating even more internal dissent, even among loyalist constituencies.

(2) Security reconstruction
Despite the severe constraints on the regime’s ability to rebuild state capacity and core competences,
it is determined to reassert uncontested security control within the country. For this purpose it
is falling back on familiar practices, despite serious doubts about their past efficacy and no lessserious impediments to reproducing them. The regime apparently seeks to restore its pre-2011
security control system, but this is no longer viable for a variety of reasons. These include the lossof experienced security cadres and the dispersal of control over loyalist armed forces, which has
resulted in a visible inability to assert government authority over areas and populations over which
it has regained physical control. Making this weakness worse is the regime’s inability to defuse
security threats by offering material trade-offs (economic and financial), addressing the sources ofloyalist dissent, or rehabilitating itself politically.
The fact that the regime, Russia, and Iran are moreover pursuing separate, and at times
contradictory, efforts to consolidate their control over government security agencies and armed
forces further delays the rehabilitation of regime power and increases the costs to it. Paradoxically,
the regime seeks to assert its security authority to the exclusion of all other political and military
actors, whether Syrian or foreign, and yet refuses stubbornly to undertake meaningful reforms,
however modest, in either the political or economic domains as a means of easing its multiple
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security dilemmas.

(a) Resuming repression
In regime-controlled areas, loyalist security and military agencies are using the strict application of
conscription against young men and former opposition fighters as a form of punishment and control.
But the degree of the regime’s territorial and administrative control varies from area to area. It
ranges from direct coercion and intimidation in the Damascus region, for example, to a general lackof control in the Daraa area, where the regime is simply one of numerous actors that share control
of what the Center for Operational Analysis and Research (COAR) called “an assemblage of ‘zones
of influence’… a ‘security archipelago’.”2 Indeed, assassinations and attacks on regime forces inthe southern region have been occurring daily for over a year, and by January 2020 the future ofgovernment control there was in question, raising the possibility of challenges to its authority inother areas, including the large semi-rural belt around Damascus.3
In the northwest and northeast of Syria, the regime grudgingly co-exists with the US-protected
and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the National Liberation Army (NLA) that istrained and protected by Turkey. Ironically, this may work in the regime’s favour, as it simply does
not have the manpower (nor the funds) to expand into more territory and stabilize it. But its attempts
to recapture parts of Idlib province suggest that asserting formal sovereign control is a priority
nonetheless, even if taking over more territory poses other kinds of risks. In a sense, this order ofpriorities suggests that the regime relies overwhelmingly on securitizing and militarizing all its
problems as a means of maintaining its ability to retain the support of loyalist constituencies.

(b) Rebuilding the security and defence sectors
During the main period of the war, the Assad regime was compelled to delegate operationalcommand to multiple lower-level and loyalist non-state actors. As part of the same process it also
ceded extensive authority to Russia and Iran (and the Lebanese organization, Hezbullah) not only
to recruit and operate loyalist militias, but also to acquire influence within the official security andmilitary institutions. After years of fragmentation and heavy losses, the regime now seems to be
pursuing a new policy aimed at tying the reins of control firmly in the hands of Assad himself.4 Thiscan be seen from the replacement or retirement of numerous senior officers, who are being replacedwith unknown figures likely to owe their loyalty to the president.
The process may progress slowly so long as the regime still needs the military support of its allies.
Indeed, it may not succeed at all in the foreseeable future: opposition sources speak of a competition
between these various allies to control army divisions or agencies such as Military Intelligence and̶ 99 ̶

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Air Force Intelligence, so the regime may gain relative but not absolute control. Starting in late
2018, Syrian opposition sources even argued that various incidents in which senior officers wererotated between commands, detained, or even killed were part of hidden struggles between Russia,
Iran, and members of Assad’s inner circle to gain the upper hand within the armed forces.5 Regime
determination to assert control is moreover handicapped by its lack of funds; insiders report that thisprevents them from taking over and disbanding loyalist militias established by Russia and Iran, as thegovernment can neither pay salaries or severance compensation nor provide credit or skills training
programs and small loans to assist the return of militiamen to civilian life.6(c) Stand-off with the SDF and NLA
For the time being, the regime is unable to disband or eliminate these two forces, which aresupported by external powers. (In fact U.S. military assistance and strategic support for the SDF
has ceased since late 2019, compelling it to move into an uncomfortable tacit alliance with Russia
and the Assad regime.) In theory, a grand political settlement could result in a quick resolution anddismantling of the autonomous zones of control now protected by the US, Turkey, and Russia. But
multiple factors work against it. One is the strategic stand-off between the US on the one side andIran, Russia, and Turkey on the other, which blocks political or territorial movement inside Syria.
Another is the difficulty of bridging the gap between what the Kurds demand and the regime will
accept, without which Turkey will not withdraw from Syria; this, in turn, ensures the survival of the
NLA.
Turkey’s military incursion into northeast Syria in October 2019 reveals the complexity of the
obstacles remaining in the way of any kind of “clean” outcome. Despite achieving significant
territorial gains and gaining some bargaining leverage, Turkey had to stop far short of its strategic
objectives of removing the SDF from the entire length of the common border, leaving SDF
administration largely intact.7 As importantly, there is precious little evidence that Turkey will
succeed in establishing the safe zone promised along the Turkish-Syrian border promised by Turkish
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, a so-called “peace corridor” that will supposedly allow the returnof around one million Syrian refugees to their country.8 Conversely, a regime offensive on thesouthern part of Idlib province, which is supposedly protected by Turkish military observation points
set up under the 2018 Sochi agreement, generated around 700,000 internally displaced persons
between April and December 2019 and expanded the zone of regime control.9(d) Strategic competition between the allies
Last but not least, the gap between Russian and Iranian strategic interest in Syria (and regarding̶ 100 ̶第2節

Syria in the Next DecadeHezbullah in Lebanon) complicates the regime’s efforts to reassert its exclusive authority andcontrol. There are aspects both of complementarity and of competition, and at times outrightcontestation, between Russia, Iran, and the regime. This was made evident in the government
campaign against opposition-held towns in northern Hama and southern Idlib provinces in mid2019: strikingly, both Russia and Iran opposed a military offensive in order to avoid damaging theirseparate relationship with Turkey, in which both have invested heavily, but the regime went ahead
regardless. It lacks the manpower and firepower, however, to act independently in the rest of Idlib,
let alone challenge US and Turkish protected forces in the northwest and northeast. Russia has alsosought assertively to curtail Iranian influence in the southern border region near Israel, to the extent
of replacing the government in negotiating security agreements with local communities and former
opposition fighters.

(3) Reconstruction and the economy
The Assad regime’s efforts to assert its control over the entire country are impeded by majorsocial and economic problems. One of the most important, and immediate, challenges facing thegovernment is its lack of funding and the dismal prospects for any improvement. A study conducted
for the World Bank in 2019 observed that Syria has suffered physical destruction, demographic
dislocation, and economic disorganization “at a scale more common in inter-state wars than civil
conflicts.”10 The country’s needs for capital are enormous: anything between $300 billion and $1
trillion. The same study assessed that, unless there is a genuine political settlement and significant
external assistance, it could take Syria at least 22 years to reach its pre-conflict level of Gross
Domestic Product (GDP) and almost 29 years to reach its pre-conflict level of GDP per capita.11
Reflecting the unavailability of capital flows and severe weakness of underlying economic
fundamentals, the national currency – the Syrian Lira (Pound) – lost 68 percent of its value against
the U.S. dollar in the year up to the end of 2019, after which it lost another 30 percent in the firsttwo weeks of 2020 (before recovering slightly).12 This dire financial picture is exceedingly unlikely
to change for the better. Sanctions imposed by Western governments since 2011 remain in place andare set to endure. U.S. sanctions, in particular, will take years to be dismantled even if the politicaldecision to do so is taken. And as the regime has sought to create new markets and income streams,
for example by offering prime real estate to attract Syrian and foreign capital back to the country,
new EU sanctions have blocked these efforts.
More damaging than sanctions, however, is the fear among banks of running afoul of U.S. policy,
which has prompted them to refuse even legitimate business transactions undertake by or on behalfof Syrian companies and individuals. Most Western governments moreover oppose providing Syria
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with reconstruction aid in the absence of a meaningful political transition, resulting in growing
shortages of numerous basic goods (such as fuel for household and industrial use, spare parts, andthe like), rising prices and inflation, and the growth of black market activities inside Syria.

(a) Economic disorganization
But even if capital flows were to improve, economic disorganization poses another major challenge,
not just physical destruction. Commercial families and the regional and international trade networks
they built are gone, while the impacts of the loss of skilled labour are already felt throughout theprivate and public sectors.13 The social consequences are no less significant; the regime is unable toease the huge material and human burden of the war on the Alawi community, its primary politicalconstituency. For example, the Military Housing Establishment (Milihouse), a contracting and realestate development company owned by the Ministry of Defence, increased the price of houses it sells
mostly in loyalist areas by 500 percent in mid-2019.14 Similarly, the increase of young Alawi males
joining the military reflects the deepening of their dependence on public sector employment and thelack of employment alternatives.15
The regime has nonetheless stubbornly remained completely unwilling to undertake political,
administrative, or economic reforms that might help reopen credit lines, revive trade and production,
reactivate markets, and enhance social acceptance. Instead, it has responded with what may becalled a “Bandaid approach:” it seeks to survive through a combination of humanitarian assistance,savings from under-investment in reconstruction or from not repatriating and rehabilitating refugees
and internally displaced persons, income from developing the real estate market, and selling various
extraction and management licenses and franchises to Russia and Iran. This constitutes the closestthat the Syrian government has come to a reconstruction plan, despite its publication of a National
Development Programme for Post-War Syria in 2017, which has not yet been translated into a
concrete strategy, let alone into substantial activity.16(b) Cronyism
These measures are poorly integrated, and have so far proven seriously inadequate. Indeed, they havegiven rise to further problems, of which the intensification of crony business behaviour is especiallynotable. Poverty and unemployment affect some 80 percent of the population, but the remaining 20
percent include many who actually thrived on the international sanctions regime, which allowed
them to tighten their grip on parts of the economy. Crony capitalists had already become prominent
before 2011, but economic cronyism has now become dominant, with new cronies constantly
emerging, including former army and militia commanders.17 Having made their initial fortunes from̶ 102 ̶第2節

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the war economy, some have reinvested in new ventures in the steel, tourism, freight, and real estate
sectors.18 Yet crony businessmen are vulnerable too; some had their assets frozen on various charges
in 2018, but at least 140 had their assets confiscated in the second half of 2019, whether in response
to predatory behaviour that undermined government schemes to generate income or because the
cash-strapped regime regarded them as easy targets.19(c) Dynamics of capital scarcity
The fact that the regime will direct government agencies to target crony businessmen reveals thedepth of its financial crisis. But conditions of scarcity have generated other forms of competitive andpredatory behaviour, often led by official security agencies. In former opposition strongholds around
Damascus such as al-Ghoutah, for example, local inhabitants have the financial means to rebuild
their homes (if not their businesses), but are not able to do so. The relevant authorities issue permits,
as they have an interest in the regeneration of construction and other economic activity, but eachgeographical area is divided into rival zones of control among security agencies that treat them as
fiefdoms, and so their approval must also be sought, in return for bribes.
This pattern is reminiscent of conditions before 2011, when growing scarcity of resources andeconomic opportunities prompted security agents to engage in smuggling and other black market
activities and in extortion, and to enter civilian markets in direct competition with legal businesses.
The regime appears helpless to curb their behaviour even though it undermines regime goals. But inother instances it allows cronies to form their own private militias to protect their businesses, so as toreduce that burden on itself. These coalitions of powerful officials or political leaders, businessmen,
and security agencies are unstable, but the pattern is likely to endure.

(d) Russian and Iranian investments
The government has sought to increase foreign investment and assistance as a means of partiallycircumventing these dynamics. Syria offers only modest business opportunities, but an “economic
bloc” of the Russian elite is aggressively seizing these. Russian gas company Stroytransgaz, which isunder U.S. sanctions, won a 49-year lease to run Tartous port and oil storage facility and manages theHoms General Fertilizers Company and phosphate mines, while others have received state contracts
for the exploration and production of oil and gas and will undertake rehabilitation of roads, railways,
and wheat granaries.20
Iran, too, has signed numerous agreements relating to the economy and public infrastructure over
the years, and has sought franchises to extract phosphates and manage ports and airports and todeliver housing and other projects in Syria. But despite impressive scale and ambitious targets, these̶ 103 ̶第2章

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agreements often not been implemented fully, or even at all. In any case the prospective income
for the Syrian government is relatively modest, as Russia and Iran are using these deals to secure
repayment on their wartime assistance to Syria, which only receives a minor share of profits.21
Regional developments also do not bode well for Syria, which used to export significant amountsof agricultural and light industrial products to neighbouring countries and the Gulf, and to earn feesfrom the transit of large volumes of goods between Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, and the Gulf. All
these markets are in turmoil or decline, local economies and state budgets are burdened with hosting(mostly) Syrian refugees, and overshadowed by escalating tensions between Iran and the U.S. andtheir respective allies. These conditions will impede Syrian economic recovery even further.

(4) Conclusion: The absence of politics
The Assad regime has repeatedly demonstrated its adeptness at maintaining itself through theconstruction of informal networks through which it controls formal institutions and manipulates
a wide array of social and economic actors. This is what has enabled it to survive the opposition
challenge and the ensuing civil war and multiple external military interventions that the war
generated. But its unwillingness to engage in meaningful political dialogue with any counterpart,
including its allies, let alone its adversaries, has denied it the ability to reduce the costs of regime
maintenance while generating greater domestic resources.
Given this background, periodic government decrees raising public sector salaries will only fuelinflation, erode the national currency further, and undermine local production.22 Similarly, initiatives
to restructure state-owned enterprises in the manufacturing, energy, banking, trading, tourism andconstruction sectors among many others will either fail as they have in the past, or transfer even morestate assets into the hands of crony businessmen. The limitations on human and financial capital are
irremediable under these conditions, and set to be chronic.
The regime can survive for the foreseeable future, during which its main political concern is to
manage relations with the Alawi community – partly through its careful allocation of command
appointments in the security agencies and armed forces to members of the various main clans – while
undermining security and social peace in areas that remain outside its physical control. The pricefor these skewed priorities and deliberate avoidance of politics (and meaningful diplomacy) will beendemic violence in the peripheries of the country, an economy characterized to a high degree by
black market and informal activities, and continued international isolation and pariah status (at least
for Western governments that control Syria’s access to principal sources of credit and trade).

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Syria in the Next Decade─ Notes ─
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Growing interest noted in “Despite Official Statements, Iranians Struggle to Advance Economic Interests
in Syria,” Syria Report, November 6, 2019 <https://www.syria-report.com/news/economy/despite-officialstatements-iranians-struggle-advance-economic-interests-syria>, accessed on November 6, 2019. Minimal
Chinese investment is noted in “Rare Chinese Investment Set to Launch Soon,” Syria Report, January 22, 2020
<https://www.syria-report.com/news/manufacturing/rare-chinese-investment-set-launch-soon>, accessed on
January 22, 2020.
“Security Archipelago: Security Fragmentation in Dar’a Governorate,” Center for Operational Analysis andResearch, December 3, 2019 <https://coar-global.org/2019/12/03/security-archipelago/>, accessed on December
3, 2019.
“Syria Update,” Center for Operational Analysis and Research, January 20, 2020 <https://coar-global.
org/2020/01/20/syria-update-20-january-2020/?utm_source=COAR+Global+RM&utm_campaign=dcaad13befE M A I L _ C A M PA I G N _ 2 0 2 0 _ 0 1 _ 2 0 _ 0 5 _ 1 4 & u t m _ m e d i u m = e m a i l & u t m _ t e r m = 0 _ 7 b 9 c f b c 5 8 4 dcaad13bef-80403347>, accessed on January 20, 2020. Assassinations in opposition areas are discussed in several
sources such as “Assassinations in Opposition Areas from February to July 2019,” Omran Center for Strategic
Studies, September 17, 2019 <https://bit.ly/36iTj2b>, accessed on January 20, 2020.
The difficulties of this are discussed in Ammar Kahf, The Syrian Regime: Reforming Amidst Competing Partners,
Omran Center for Strategic Studies, June 3, 2019 <https://bit.ly/2TRWHOP>, accessed on January 20, 2020.
“Russian Efforts to Control Armed Forces in Syria in 2018,” Strategy Watch, December 23, 2018 <https://
strategy-watch.com/research-and-studies/russian-efforts-acquire-armed-forces-syria-2018/>, accessed on January
20, 2020; and “Syria: Drivers of the Internal Struggle in the Military Establishment and its Expected Outcomes in
2019,” Strategy Watch, January 13, 2019 <https://strategy-watch.com/research-and-studies/syria-engines-internalconflict-military-mechanisms/>, accessed on January 20, 2020.
Based on interviews.
See, for example, the assessment of Gayle Tzemach Lemmon, “Syria’s Kurdish Forces Hold Back the Tides,”January 15, 2020 <https://fam.ag/36jbR2u>, accessed on January 15, 2020.
“Turkey, Iran, Russia meet in fifth Syria summit,” Hürriyet Daily News, September 16, 2019 <http://www.
hurriyetdailynews.com/turkey-iran-russia-meet-in-fifth-syria-summit-146588>, accessed on September 16, 2019.
“Nearly 300,000 Syrians displaced from Idlib since mid-December, Security Council hears,” UN News, January 3,
2020, p. 2 <https://news.un.org/en/story/2020/01/1054741>, accessed on January 3, 2020.
Sharmila Devadas, Ibrahim Ahmed Elbadawi, and Norman V. Loayza, Growth after War in Syria, Policy
Research working paper no. WPS 8967, World Bank Group, 2019 <http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/
en/424551565105634645/Growth-after-War-in-Syria>, accessed on January 15, 2020.
Ibid., p. 28.
“Government’s Fear Approach Fails to Stop Pound’s Freefall,” The Syria Report, January 22, 2020 <https://www.syria-report.com/news/finance/government%E2%80%99s-fear-approach-fails-stop-pound%E2%80%99sfreefall>, accessed on January 22, 2020.
On the dire lack of manpower see, for example, Eugenio Dacrema, “Reconstructing Syria: Assad’s Goals
and Interests,” Commentary, Italian Institute for International Political Studies, March 8, 2019 <https://www.
ispionline.it/en/pubblicazione/reconstructing-syria-assads-goals-and-interests-22464>, accessed on January 22,
2020; and “State-owned Companies Report Manpower Shortages,” The Syria Report, October 16, 2018 <https://www.syria-report.com/news/economy/state-owned-companies-report-manpower-shortages>, accessed on October
16, 2018.
“Sharp Increase in Price of Affordable Housing Units Sold in Loyalist Areas,” The Syria Report, August 6, 2019<https://www.syria-report.com/news/real-estate-construction/sharp-increase-price-affordable-housing-units-soldloyalist-areas>, accessed on August 6, 2019.
Based on interviews.
For a useful review of reconstruction needs and challenges, see Eugenio Dacrema and Valeria Talbot (eds),
Rebuilding Syria: The Middle East’s Next Power Game?, Italian Institute for International Political Studies,
September 2019 <https://www.ispionline.it/en/pubblicazione/rebuilding-syria-middle-easts-next-power-

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game-23863>, accessed on January 22, 2020.
“Warlords Increasingly Integrating into Syria’s Formal Economy,” The Syria Report, May 15, 2018 <https://www.syria-report.com/news/economy/warlords-increasingly-integrating-syria%E2%80%99s-formal-economy>,accessed on May 15, 2018.
An example is the Qaterji family, discussed in “Qaterji Expanding Investments in Aleppo,” The Syria Report,
October 16, 2019 <https://www.syria-report.com/news/real-estate-construction/qaterji-expanding-investmentsaleppo>, accessed on October 16, 2019.
For examples, “Asset Freezes, Key Regime Tool to Pressure Investors into Coercion,” The Syria Report, May 22,2018 <https://www.syria-report.com/news/economy/asset-freezes-key-regime-tool-pressure-investors-coercion>,
accessed on May 22, 2018. “More Pressure on Makhlouf as Government Targets Syriatel,” The Syria Report,
September 25, 2019 <https://www.syria-report.com/news/telecoms-it/more-pressure-makhlouf-governmenttargets-syriatel>, accessed on September 25, 2019; and “More Pressure on Business Community as Central
Bank Freezes Bank Accounts of Prominent Investors,” The Syria Report, October 9, 2019 <https://www.syriareport.com/news/economy/more-pressure-business-community-central-bank-freezes-bank-accounts-prominentinvestors>, accessed on October 9, 2019; and “Akhras Targeted Again with Asset and Bank Account Freeze,” The
Syria Report, December 11, 2019 <https://www.syria-report.com/news/economy/akhras-targeted-again-asset-andbank-account-freeze>, accessed on December 11, 2019. On predatory behaviour that has prompted government
retaliation, “State’s Drive to Boost Revenues from Rented Properties Complicated by Controversy, Cronyism,”
The Syria Report, November 20, 2019 <https://www.syria-report.com/news/real-estate-construction/states-driveboost-revenues-rented-properties-complicated-controversy->, accessed on November 20, 2019.
Chloe Cornish, Asser Khattab, and Henry Foy, “Moscow collects its spoils of war in Assad’s Syria,” Financial
Times, September 1, 2019 <https://www.ft.com/content/30ddfdd0-b83e-11e9-96bd-8e884d3ea203>, accessedon September 1, 2019; and “Ministry of Petroleum Awards Russian Companies the Right to Explore for Oiland Gas,” The Syria Report, September 11, 2019 <https://www.syria-report.com/news/oil-gas-mining/ministrypetroleum-awards-russian-companies-right-explore-oil-and-gas>, accessed on September 11, 2019.
Poor results for Iran are noted in “Despite Official Statements, Iranians Struggle to Advance Economic Interests
in Syria,” The Syria Report, November 6, 2019 <https://www.syria-report.com/news/economy/despite-officialstatements-iranians-struggle-advance-economic-interests-syria>, accessed on November 6, 2019. Syria’s modest
share of profits is demonstrated by the agreement with Syrian Russia’s Stroytransgaz to develop phosphate mines
near Palmyra, which awards profits on a 70/30 basis in favour of Stroytransgaz, “Syrian Phosphate Sector to
Benefit from Russian, Iranian Interest,” The Syria Report, March 27, 2018 <https://www.syria-report.com/news/
oil-gas-mining/syrian-phosphate-sector-benefit-russian-iranian-interest>, accessed on March 27, 2018.
“Size and Timing of Huge Pay Hike Raise Questions About Government Policy,” The Syria Report, November
27, 2019 <https://www.syria-report.com/news/economy/size-and-timing-huge-pay-hike-raise-questions-aboutgovernment-policy>, accessed on November 27, 2019.

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