Russian President Putin denies defeat after rebels took over Syria

Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Russia has not been defeated in Syria after rebel groups ousted his ally and longtime leader, Bashar al-Assad, earlier this month, Al Jazeera reported.

On Thursday, Putin said he had not yet met the former Syrian ruler who fled to the Russian capital, but that he “will definitely talk to him” and planned to meet him in Moscow, as per Al Jazeera.

He mentioned he would ask Assad about the fate of missing US reporter Austin Tice, whose release was described by the White House as a “top priority”, Al Jazeera reported.

Speaking at his annual end-of-the-year news conference, Putin also denied claims of Russia’s loss with the fall of the former regime. Russia intervened in Syria in 2015 and turned the tide of the civil war there in Assad’s favour.

“You want to present what is happening in Syria as a defeat for Russia,” Al Jazeera quoted Putin as saying. “I assure you it is not … we have achieved our goals.”

He said Russia intervened in Syria to “prevent a terrorist enclave from being created there” and that “it is not for nothing that today many European countries and the United States want to establish relations with them [Syria’s new rulers]”.

“We maintain relations with all the groups that control the situation there, with all the countries in the region,” Putin continued, adding that the “overwhelming majority of them tell us that they would be interested in our military bases remaining in Syria”.

Russia offered to maintain bases there “for humanitarian purposes”, he said. He also admitted to having evacuated 4,000 Iranian fighters in the aftermath of the fall of the Assad government.

Notably, Syria’s newly appointed Prime Minister, Mohammed al-Bashir, has focused on repatriating Syrian refugees living abroad as one of his key goals. Al-Bashir aims to “bring back the millions of Syrian refugees who are abroad” as part of efforts to restore stability in the country.