Syria looks to end foreign military presence, have sovereignty over all bases: President

BEIRUT — Syria is looking to no longer “have any foreign military bases,” President Ahmad al-Sharaa said at an Atlantic Council event, allowing the country to have “complete and pure sovereignty of the Syrian state.”

Prior to al-Sharaa coming into power in December 2024, Russia operated from dozens of military bases in Syria, which it used to help keep the Assad regime in power. Since the regime was overthrown, the number of Russian military bases has shrank considerably, he said.

“They had around 170 military bases, and now there are only two bases,” al-Sharaa said Tuesday. “And after long discussions with them, we reached a point where we changed or we transformed those bases into training bases for the Syrian army, so they are not military bases that can oversee or provide any logistical work for operations that are launched from those bases against other countries.”

In August, Syria and Russia inked a memorandum of understanding (MOU) regarding those remaining two military bases — Hmeimim Air Base and Tartus Naval Base — to turn them into “joint training and qualification centers.”

Syria has also reduced the number of military bases owned by neighboring Turkey, al-Sharaa said, though he did not mention how many there were or how many remain. During the Assad regime, Turkey had a military presence along with observation posts in the northern and northwestern parts of Syria to protect its borders from an infiltration of terrorists and armed militias.

Those Turkish bases were not previously endorsed by Syrian parliament, but al-Sharaa said the country is looking to get “legal status” for the remaining Turkish bases because “any presence or any foreign presence should be under the endorsement of the People’s Assembly and to have a legal status.”

He added that Damascus “very soon will not have the necessity to have any military or foreign military presence, and I believe we can go through the relations, diplomatic relations, and respect with all the countries in the neighborhoods and the friends of Syria.”

Notably, the two countries in May displayed their close defense ties when Syria participated for the first time in Turkey’s Efes military exercise.