Macron arrives in Syria as first major western leader to visit war-torn country under new leadership.
French President Emmanuel Macron has arrived in Syria, becoming the first major western leader to visit since Bashar al-Assad's ouster in 2024.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited Syria in April, but Emmanuel Macron is the first leader from Western Europe or North America to make such a visit. The French president’s trip comes during a period of relative calm in the Middle East after the month-long war in Iran and Lebanon.
Macron was greeted at Damascus airport by Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shibani. Syria’s state-run SANA news agency said the French president was visiting with a business delegation to discuss regional security, as well as business and investment opportunities.
Details of Macron’s visit were not disclosed for security reasons.
He will next travel to Ankara, Turkey, for the NATO summit. Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa is also expected to attend the forum and hold a high-profile meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump.
Against the backdrop of Iran burying its supreme leader, who was killed in February, and Hamas beginning to disarm in Gaza, Emmanuel Macron is travelling to Damascus for the first visit by a French president to Syria since 2009, when Nicolas Sarkozy met then-President Bashar al-Assad, who was later ousted.
Macron hosted al-Sharaa in Paris in May 2025, when he urged European leaders and the United States to lift longstanding sanctions on Damascus. Most of those sanctions have since been lifted.