Syrian President Bashar Assad will reportedly visit Iran in the coming days, according to Iranian media.
The visit will focus on the situation in Syria, and he will meet with several senior Iranian officials in Tehran, according to several Iranian news outlets quoted by Lebanon’s NOW news website.
Saturday, Oct. 3, 2015. A Russian SU-24M jet fighter armed with laser guided bombs takes off from a runaway at Hmeimim airbase in Syria. (AP Photo/Alexander Kots, Komsomolskaya Pravda, Photo via AP)
According to Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency, Assad’s plane will traverse Iraqi airspace and be escorted by four Russian fighter jets.
“The US-led international coalition’s air command has been warned not to approach Bashar Assad’s plane to avoid engagement,” Fars quotes the Lebanese al-Diyar daily saying.
The visit, planned for the next few weeks according to Fars, will be Assad’s second abroad in several months after he visited Moscow in October, since hunkering down amid the civil war that has raged for nearly five years.
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