The British-born spouse of deposed Syrian president Bashar al-Assad will not be looking for a divorce, a Kremlin spokesman has mentioned.
Reports in Turkish media had recommended Asma al-Assad wished to finish her marriage and depart Russia, the place she and her husband have been granted asylum after a insurgent coalition overthrew the previous president’s regime and took management of Damascus.
Asked in regards to the studies in a information convention name, Dmitry Peskov mentioned, “No, they don’t correspond to actuality.”
He additionally denied studies that Assad had been confined to Moscow and that his property belongings had been frozen.
Russia was a staunch ally of the Assad regime and supplied it army assist in the course of the civil conflict.
But studies in Turkish media on Sunday recommended the Assads have been dwelling beneath extreme restrictions within the Russian capital, and that the previous Syrian first woman had filed for divorce and wished to return to London.
Mrs Assad is a twin Syrian-British nationwide, however the UK international secretary has beforehand mentioned she wouldn’t be allowed to return to Britain.
Speaking in parliament earlier this month, David Lammy mentioned: “I need it confirmed that she’s a sanctioned particular person and isn’t welcome right here within the UK.”
He added he would do “the whole lot I can in my energy” to make sure no member of the Assad household “finds a spot within the UK”.
In an announcement attributed to Bashar al-Assad final week, he mentioned he had by no means meant to flee Syria, however he was airlifted from a Russian army base at Moscow’s request.
Asma al-Assad, 49, was born within the UK to Syrian dad and mom in 1975 and grew up in Acton, west London.
She moved to Syria in 2000 on the age of 25 and married her husband simply months after he succeeded his father as president.
Throughout her 24 years as Syria’s first woman, Mrs Assad was a topic of curiosity in western media.
A controversial 2011 Vogue profile known as her “a rose within the desert” and described her as “the freshest and most magnetic of first women”. The article has since been faraway from the Vogue web site.
Just one month later, Mrs Assad was criticised for remaining silent whereas her husband violently repressed pro-democracy campaigners at the beginning of the Syrian civil conflict.
The battle went on to assert the lives of round half one million individuals, together with her husband accused of utilizing chemical weapons towards civilians.
In 2016, Mrs Assad advised Russian state-backed tv she had rejected a deal to supply her secure passage out of the war-torn nation to be able to stand by her husband.
She introduced she was being handled for breast most cancers in 2018 and mentioned she had made a full restoration one yr later.
She was identified with leukaemia and commenced therapy for the illness in May this yr, the workplace of then-President Assad introduced.
An announcement mentioned she would “quickly withdraw” from public engagements.
