Bashar al-Assad, the long-ruling Syrian dictator toppled last year and now living in exile under Kremlin protection, was allegedly poisoned in Moscow, according to a human rights watchdog.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that Assad was rushed to a Moscow-area hospital on September 20 in critical condition after a suspected poisoning at his villa outside the capital. He was discharged last week after recovering, but questions linger over who was behind the attempt.
The group’s director, Rami Abdul Rahman, citing a reliable source, said the incident was not linked to the Russian or US governments but may have been designed to cast suspicion on the Kremlin. Russian authorities have so far declined to comment.
Assad, once propped up militarily by Moscow during Syria’s brutal civil war, now lives in guarded seclusion near the Russian capital with his inner circle. His brother Maher and top aide Mansour Azzam reportedly visited him during his hospital stay.
The former strongman’s exile has been marked by uncertainty and isolation. His wife Asma, is undergoing treatment for leukemia and has privately expressed a desire to return to London, according to her family.
In respect to numerous Syrians still winding from decades of war, the news stirs a mix of emotions: outrage, indifference, even grim satisfaction. Many raged that he destroyed our Syria and ran away to currently be living under Putin’s shadow; and believe that what happened to him is justice catching up with him
The alleged poisoning highlights the precarious fate of the deposed leaders who once thrived on absolute power in various circumstances and sovereign locations. In Assad’s case, his fall from presidential palace in Damascus to a guarded silence in Moscow points out how personal survival and geopolitics remain fatally intertwined.
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