HANGZHOU, China: Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad on Thursday began his first official trip to China in almost two decades, state media reported, where he will ask a longtime ally for financial support to help rebuild his devastated country.
China becomes one of only a handful of countries outside the Middle East that Assad has visited since the 2011 start of a civil war that has since killed more than half a million people, displaced millions more, and battered Syria's infrastructure and industry.Assad also becomes the latest in a string of leaders ostracized by the West to be feted by Beijing, with Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro and Iran's President Ebrahim Raisi visiting this year, as well as top Russian officials.
AFP PHOTO / SANA'This visit represents an important rupture in the diplomatic isolation and the political siege imposed on Syria,' Damascus-based political scientist Oussama Dannoura told AFP.'China has been breaking Western taboos that seek to prevent a number of states from dealing with countries that Washington considers isolated,' he added.Growing presence The visit comes as China expands its engagement in the Middle East.
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