Putin offers Syria’s Sharaa support and cooperation

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MOSCOW (Reuters) -President Vladimir Putin sent a message to Syrian leader Ahmed al-Sharaa backing efforts to ensure Syria’s territorial integrity and offering Russia’s “practical cooperation” on a whole range of issues, the Kremlin said on Thursday.

The fall in December of President Bashar al-Assad to rebels led by Sharaa after 13 years of civil war has forced Russia to scramble to secure its bases in the country. Moscow is also concerned by a wave of sectarian killings in Syria.

Putin told Sharaa he supported “efforts to stabilise the situation in the country as soon as possible in the interests of ensuring its sovereignty, independence, unity and territorial integrity,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, according to Russian news agencies.

Putin confirmed “Russia’s continuing readiness to develop practical cooperation with the Syrian leadership on the whole range of issues on the bilateral agenda in order to strengthen traditionally friendly Russian-Syrian relations,” Peskov said.

The Kremlin, which was a key ally of the formerly ruling Assad family for over 50 years, said earlier this month that it wanted to see a united and “friendly” Syria because instability there could affect the whole of the Middle East.

Reuters reported in December that Russia was pulling back forces from front lines in northern Syria and from posts in mountains dominated by Assad’s Alawite community, but was not leaving its two main bases on the Mediterranean coast – the Hmeimim airbase in Latakia and the naval facility in Tartous.

(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge; editing by Mark Heinrich)