Standing at the gates of the Khmeimim airbase, a fighter from the Islamist rebel group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) eyed a pink vape being puffed on by a Russian soldier. Catching his gaze, the soldier offered it to him. The bearded fighter took a drag and shrugged, giving a thumbs up to the Russian soldier, who let him keep it.
Just over a week ago, Russian jets taking off from Khmeimim airbase were heading to northern Syria to drop bombs on rebel groups. This week, Russians are negotiating with the same factions, now in control of the country after their 12-day lightning offensive that toppled the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad.
“We don’t feel unsafe, we are hoping to make friendly relations with the new government as soon as it becomes a legitimate government,” said a representative of the Russian military, who allowed the Guardian rare access to the Khmeimim airbase on Sunday. The representative said communications with HTS started a week ago to coordinate military affairs between Russian forces in Syria and the country’s new leaders.
“Neither side is making provocations and things have been fine,” the Russian military representative said, as he gestured to boxes of humanitarian aid and Russian ministry of defence-branded backpacks, which they said were a gift from Russia to the Syrian people.
HTS fighters guarded the gates of the airbase as Russian Mig fighter jets took off. “We used to be scared whenever we would hear the sound of a Russian jet – now it’s become normal,” Abu Khaled, a 26-year-old HTS fighter guarding the airbase said. Outside, Russian soldiers still milled about the town of Khmeimim, shopping at stores whose signs were written in Cyrillic.
Russian forces first entered Syria in 2015 when Assad requested their military assistance against opposition forces, which he had been fighting since Syria’s 2011 revolution. Now their presence in Syria has been called into question as the opposition take the reins of power.
The EU foreign affairs chief, Kaja Kallas, said on Monday that Russia and Iran “should not have a place” in Syria, and said the bloc would raise the issue of Russian military bases with the country’s new leadership.
HTS and Russia are at the “first step” of negotiations over if and how Russia will maintain its military bases in post-Assad Syria, an HTS official familiar with the talks told the Guardian. Both sides described the atmosphere of the negotiations as positive.
Though the HTS official acknowledged Russia’s role in “bombing innocent civilians” in Syria since 2015, it seemed the rebel group was taking a pragmatic approach towards its relations with foreign powers. The HTS official said there would be “no red lines” in negotiations with the Russians, which would be based on “strategic interests, not ideology”.
Moscow and HTS have both made their opening moves: Moscow offered humanitarian aid to Syria, which is mired in an economic and humanitarian crisis. This was refused, as HTS felt it had several foreign donors already beating on its door.
In his first public comments since he was forced from power, Assad said on Monday that his first stop after fleeing Damascus was the Khmeimim airbase, where he claimed to have overseen combat operations between fleeing to Moscow.
The HTS official said the new Syrian government would seek the extradition of Assad, or ask him to be turned over to the international criminal court. They added that they were not optimistic that Russia would grant either request.
The primary aim of HTS appears to be establishing good economic and political relations with Russia and other international powers, which the HTS official said would confer legitimacy on the new rebel government. The official cited the hasty pullout of US forces from Afghanistan in 2021 as a lesson on what the group wanted to avoid with Russia.
To that end, HTS has provided security for Russian forces over the last few days as they moved vehicles and personnel from the T4 airbase in Homs, central Syria, to Khmeimim airbase and Tartous port. Columns of Russian armoured personnel carriers, tanks and pickup trucks with the Russian flag waving and a large “Z” painted on the sides have filled Syria’s highways for the past two days, escorted by HTS fighters.
The Russian military representative confirmed that the T4 airbase in Homs had been completely emptied out of personnel and equipment by Saturday, in coordination with HTS. The representative added that troops were not withdrawing from Syria but just repositioning, while they waited for Russia’s presidency to make a decision about what to do next.
Living conditions in the besieged T4 base had become dire in the last week, with refuse building up and food supplies growing low, according to the HTS official – allegations on which the Russian representative did not comment.
Khmeimim airbase and Tartous port are now the only active Russian bases in Syria – a far cry from the vast military footprint Moscow maintained in the country under Assad.
The question of Tartous appeared easier to resolve than the airbase, as the HTS official said the group was open to allowing the Russians to maintain their control over the port, citing international law as a complication for cancelling the 49-year lease of the naval facility – even if it was signed with the now deposed Assad regime.
Whether the Syrian people would accept a continued Russian presence in the country after years of Russian jets bombing people in rebel-held territory was another question. “This is not a peaceful country, go look at Idlib and the liberated areas, they are all destroyed,” Abo Khaled said, gesturing at the Russian jets taking off from Khmeimim airbase.
HTS, on its part, seems willing to turn the page on the bloody past of the Syrian civil war and focus on pulling Syria out of its miserable humanitarian state.
“We are forced to repair relations, the country is dead, people are very poor. People are trying hard to stop the bloodshed, they would like to build a new life and move forward,” the HTS official said.
Ziad Taweel, the head of the Latakia international airport that borders the Russian airbase, said HTS had instructed him to go back to work and get the civilian airport back online, but he had only been granted approval by the Russians to return on Sunday. The last civilian flight from the airport was almost two weeks ago and the exterior of the airport was littered with abandoned army vehicles and boxes of weaponry, though the interior was left untouched.
As Taweel inspected the airport, escorted by balaclava-wearing Russian commandos, an HTS fighter and a soldier joked. The HTS fighter, gazing at Russian Mrap military vehicles and planes, made sure to take some selfies with the Russian military officials, before walking off the base towards his colleagues.
