By Hatem Maher and Menna AlaaElDin
CAIRO (Reuters) – Holding elections in Syria could take four years, Syrian leader Ahmed al-Sharaa said in a statement on Sunday, the first time he has commented on the timetable for elections since the ouster of Bashar al-Assad. month.
Drafting a new constitution could take three years, Sharaa said in an interview with Saudi broadcaster Al Arabiya. He also said it will take about a year for Syrians to see major changes.
The comments by Sharaa, who heads the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group that ousted Assad on December 8, come as the new government in Damascus seeks to reassure its neighbors that it has moved away from its roots in the Islamist movement.
The group's power campaign ended a 13-year civil war but left many questions about the future of the multinational country where foreign powers including Turkey and Russia have strong and potentially competitive interests.
While Western powers largely welcome the end of the Assad family's rule in Syria, it remains unclear whether the group will impose strict Islamist rule or show flexibility and move toward democracy.
Sharaa said that HTS, formerly known as Nusra Front, will be dissolved in a national dialogue conference.
When asked about the dissolution of the party, Sharaa said: “Yes, the country cannot be run by the mentality of parties and armies.”
The group was once affiliated with the Islamic State and al-Qaeda but has since renounced both and sought to re-establish itself as a moderate force.
It has repeatedly pledged to protect minority groups, which fear the new rulers may seek to impose an Islamist government and warned of efforts to incite sectarian conflict.
According to Sharaa, the national dialogue conference will include the general participation of the Syrian people through votes on issues such as the dissolution of the parliament and the constitution.
In the case of northeastern Syria, Sharaa said there are talks with all the remaining conflict resolution groups including the US-allied Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).
“We reject Syria as a place for the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) to launch an attack on Turkey,” he said.
He said that the armed forces should be under the control of the government only, adding that the defense department will accept those who can join the army.
In an interview, Sharaa said Syria shared interests with Russia, a close ally of Assad during the long civil war with military bases in the country, echoing signs of reconciliation made by his government in the past.
Sharaa said this month that relations between Syria and Russia should serve the same interests.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the state of Russia's military bases will be the subject of negotiations with the new leaders in Damascus.
“It is a question not only of maintaining our bases or fortified areas, but also of the conditions of their operation, maintenance and supply, and cooperation with the local side,” he said in an interview with the Russian news agency RIA published on Sunday.
Sharaa also said he hoped the administration of US President-elect Donald Trump would lift the sanctions imposed on Syria. Top American diplomats who visited Damascus this month said that Sharaa came as a pragmatic and that Washington has decided to remove the $10 million bounty on the head of the HTS leader.
In response to a question about the concerns of neighboring countries about Islamic groups, he said: “We will not work to send a revolution. We want to control the stage with the mentality of the country and not the revolution,” he said, repeating that they are determined to establish strategic relations with all the countries of the region.