Events in Syria took a seismic turn on Sunday when rebels poured into Damascus after a lightning offensive that in Russia and raised hopes of an end to a 13-year civil war that has left the country in ruins.
Hundreds of thousands of people have died in Syria’s war, which began in 2011 and pitted Assad’s army against various rebel groups. Whole cities have been flattened by bombing. Millions fled or are in need of humanitarian assistance. Thousands of civilians who moved to neighbouring Turkey and Lebanon rushed back into Syria this week, their cars filled with people, luggage, and hope of a peaceful homecoming. But 10 Syrian refugees who spoke to Reuters in Europe and the United Kingdom thought differently. Returning would mean an end to a new life they have risked everything to build.
Al-Moussa and his wife Bushra al-Bukaai fled Damascus in 2015 after the birth of their second child. They spent everything they had on a two-year journey that took them to Sudan, Iran, Turkey and eventually Greece. They now have five children who are all in school and speak fluent Greek. None speak the Arabic of their parents’ homeland.
“When we talk, they ask: ‘Daddy, can we really go back to living in these areas? How did you live there before?,’” Al-Moussa said. His wife agrees. “I cannot imagine my children building their future in Syria. Not at all,” she said, their youngest son in her lap.
First-time asylum applications by Syrians to the EU were highest in 2015 and 2016 – more than 330,000 in each of those years – before dropping off significantly in the next three years, EU data show. But applications trebled between 2020 and 2023 after a devastating earthquake and as violence and economic hardship persisted. Thousands of those applications are now on hold after several European countries including Greece this week suspended asylum applications from Syrians while they consider whether Syria is safer now that Assad has gone.
“This is mentally devastating. It’s difficult that after you set your mind to live here, build a new life here, learn the language and integrate in this country, you now have to return to your homeland where basic necessities are still missing,” he told Reuters by phone.
In fear of being recruited into the army or a militia group, Alzagher, 32, said he fled the city of Raqqa in 2018. He spent time in Lebanon, Iraq and Turkey before heading to Germany in 2023. “The fall of Assad is a huge joy for all Syrians, but we who came here and went into debt to finance this journey, every time we arrive in a new place, we have to start over again. It’s difficult to think about returning to Syria now.”
Syrian refugee Zafer Nahhas applied for a British PhD program just two days before the fall of the Assad regime. Nahhas, 34, from Aleppo, said he was a wanted man in Syria after participating in an anti-government protest there. His grandfather was jailed for 13 years and many of his friends have been detained and tortured, he said.
The “possibility that they (UK authorities) could blindly reverse some decisions without any personal circumstances being factored in” was worrying, he said by phone. “It’s a whirlwind of thoughts, uncertainties and unnecessary additional concerns in our lives.”