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What next for Assad’s British wife? Could she return to the UK?

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What next for Assad's British wife? Could she return to the UK?

9 December 2024, 10:30

Asma Al Assad with her husband Bashar Al Assad

Asma Al Assad together with her husband Bashar Al Assad.

Image:
Alamy


Asma Al Assad was as soon as seen because the face of feminine liberation within the Center East; together with her profitable profession in banking and her secular British upbringing.

Now she is on the run together with her husband. A reviled determine now likened to Woman Macbeth. The times when she was generally known as ‘A Rose within the Desert’ should appear a very long time in the past.

Asma Assad was born in London in 1975, and was raised and educated within the metropolis. She is now believed to be in Moscow together with her husband, the place the ousted Syrian chief has fled.

Asma al Assad

Asma al Assad.

Image:
Alamy


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The president’s London-born spouse, Asma, 49, is the daughter of Fawaz Akhras, 78, a guide heart specialist, and Sahar, 75, a diplomat on the Syrian embassy. Her brothers, Feras, 46, and Eyad, 44, are additionally medical doctors.

The household nonetheless owns the £1 million terraced home off the A40 in Acton, west London, the place Asma grew up. Akhras is a guide on the personal Cromwell Hospital in South Kensington and medical director of Cardiac Healthcare Companies in Harley Avenue. He has not responded to requests to touch upon the present state of affairs in Syria.

There isn’t any suggestion the household has been concerned in any wrongdoing.

Asma known as herself Emma whereas a pupil at Twyford Church of England Excessive Faculty in Acton, earlier than taking A-levels on the personal Queen’s Faculty in Marylebone.

After finishing a level in pc science at King’s Faculty London she joined Deutsche Financial institution and later JP Morgan.

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She met her future husband throughout childhood holidays in Syria however they turned higher acquainted when he moved to London in 1992 to coach as an ophthalmologist on the Western Eye Hospital and married 4 years later when he took over management of Syria after the dying of his father, Hafez al-Assad, who died aged 69.

Collectively they’ve three youngsters, who’re aged between 19 and 23. It’s assumed they’re with their mother and father looking for a protected haven.

Initially after changing into Syria’s first girl, she was seen as having a reforming affect on her husband. In 2010 Vogue journal described her as a “desert rose” and a “long-limbed magnificence with a skilled analytic thoughts”.

Months later Assad started the brutal crackdown on opposition teams within the metropolis of Homs, the birthplace of his father-in-law which led to the civil struggle throughout which 500,000 individuals had been killed and 6 million left as refugees.

In 2018, Asma was recognized with breast most cancers in 2018 and in Could this 12 months introduced that she had been recognized with leukaemia.

Her household is just not coated by UK sanctions, though her mother and father and each brothers are named beneath wider US sanctions rules.

The deposed president, his spouse and a whole lot of kinfolk together with political, army and enterprise cronies are included within the 417 people and firms beneath UK sanctions. The Excessive Court docket was instructed in 2020 that Assad is believed to have a frozen account with HSBC in London with a steadiness of greater than $51.5 million (£40 million).

The Metropolitan Police struggle crimes unit opened a preliminary investigation into Asma in 2021. The drive has been contacted for an replace on progress of the investigation.

At the moment, the British authorities stated there was “no contact or no request” for the Asma to return to the UK.

Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster Pat McFadden stated “The household are in Russia so far as we all know, that is what Russian state media have stated.

“We have actually had no contact or no request for Mr Assad’s spouse to come back to the UK.”

Requested if she might train the appropriate to come back to the UK, Mr McFadden added: “I could not touch upon her particular person rights.

“I do not know her precise circumstances, so I do not know what would occur in these circumstances, but it surely’s not one thing that is been raised with us.”

“From the viewpoint of the UK Authorities, our principal concern in the mean time is what the longer term is, whether or not the rights of residents and minorities are protected and whether or not stability can come to a rustic that has had a lot violence and struggle over the previous 15 years,.”

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