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Russia has evacuated at least 400 soldiers from the Damascus region in recent days in co-ordination with the main rebel faction that toppled Bashar al-Assad’s regime, an official from the group said.
The soldiers had been stationed at the Syrian Army’s notorious Fourth Division headquarters in Qudsayya, a suburb of the capital, Kamal Lababidi, a member of the political bureau of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, told the Financial Times in an interview.
Russian soldiers stationed at the embassy in Damascus had also left over the past week and conversations were ongoing to evacuate more soldiers across the country, said Lababidi, who uses a long-held pseudonym.
The future of Russia’s presence in rebel-ruled Syria is unclear. Moscow committed troops to prop up its ally Assad during the civil war, but the exodus from Damascus is the latest sign that it is scaling back its presence.
The evacuation also points to early signs of co-operation between Moscow and HTS after years fighting on opposite sides of the brutal conflict.
Russian military envoys met HTS at the rebels’ de facto headquarters in the Four Seasons hotel in Damascus this week to negotiate safe passage of the convoy, said Lababidi, who negotiated the retreat on the Syrian side.
“The Russians came by but only for co-ordination for the retreat of bases,” Lababidi said.
He said the Russians had left Damascus in a convoy by land to Moscow’s Hmeimim air base in north-western Syria. From there, planes flew the soldiers back to Russia.
A column of almost 100 military vehicles was seen leaving the Damascus area — including armoured vehicles, tractors, fuel tankers, mobile medical units among others — in a video provided to the FT.
While there are no plans to shutter the embassy, Lababidi said a Russian official told him there would be a reduction in diplomatic activity.
Dmitry Peskov, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Russia’s foreign ministry said on Sunday it had evacuated some staff from Damascus, as well as staff in the city from the missions of North Korea, Belarus, and Abkhazia, a breakaway Caucasus statelet whose independence from Georgia is recognised by five countries.
The ministry said the “work of the Russian embassy in Damascus is ongoing” without elaborating further, according to Ria Novosti.
Russia intervened in the civil war from 2015, deploying several thousand troops and extensive air support which turned the course of the conflict in Assad’s favour until a rebel lightning offensive this month. Assad fled to Moscow.
Russia has said its future in Syria will depend on negotiations with the new government in Damascus. During its offensive, HTS signalled it was willing to work with Moscow, saying the two could find common ground in rebuilding the country.
Mikhail Bogdanov, Russia’s deputy foreign affairs minister, said this week that Russia was having “constructive” talks with HTS and hoped to retain the base for “the fight against terrorism”.
Losing Hmeimim and Moscow’s naval base at Tartus would be a strategic problem as the two locations are used as logistics hubs for Russia’s activities in the Mediterranean and operations across Africa.
In return for keeping the bases, analysts have suggested Russia could offer the new Syrian government money, energy or minerals as well as political support.
Satellite photography of Hmeimim showed a recent increase in ground vehicles, the arrival of large transport aircraft and the disassembly of Russian helicopters and air defences — all factors consistent with a retrenchment.
Asked about the future of the bases, Lababidi said Russia was not currently evacuating Hmeimim but rather pulling back personnel from other bases to there.
Several prominent Syrian families close to the Assad regime have also been hiding out at the Russian embassy in Damascus under Moscow’s protection since the regime fell a week ago, three people with direct knowledge told the FT.
Several HTS fighters guarding the embassy’s perimeter on Sunday said they were stationed there to provide protection for people inside the diplomatic mission and were not restricting their movements.
Russian embassy staff had on occasion also asked them to accompany them and act as their guards as they went out to run errands, the fighters said. Cars had been leaving the premises to get groceries and make doctor visits.
But Lababidi said Moscow had been instructed by the new Syrian government not to facilitate the departure of Syrians from the country.