DAMASCUS: Syrian President Ahmed Al-Sharaa has departed for the United States, state media reported Sunday, on a landmark trip that will see the former insurgent address the United Nations General Assembly.
State television said Sharaa was en route “to the United States of America to participate in the affairs of the 80th session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York,” citing a presidency statement.
Sharaa seized power in December after his Islamist group led a lightening offensive that toppled longtime ruler Bashar Assad after nearly 14 years of civil war and more than half a century of brutal Assad family rule.
He is set to speak at the UN General Assembly in New York, the first Syrian leader to do so since Nureddin Al-Atassi in 1967.
Sharaa has undergone a dramatic transformation since taking power, meeting foreign leaders including US President Donald Trump in Riyadh and French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris on his first trip to the West.
