Bachar al-Asad entrusts Hussein Arnous with the formation of a new government in Syria

The President of Syria, Bachar al-Asad, ordered Prime Minister Hussein Arnous to form a new government on Tuesday. A statement issued on Tuesday by the Syrian authorities announced that "President Bachar al-Asad issued Decree 210 ordering Mr. Hussein Arnous to form the ministries of the Syrian Arab Republic", as reported by the news agency SANA.

On 11 June, Al-Asad dismissed Prime Minister Imad Khamis and appointed Arnous as interim Prime Minister. Arnous previously held the post of Minister of Water Resources. On 19 July the Syrians went to the polls for the parliamentary elections, which had been scheduled two months earlier but had to be postponed owing to the COVID-19 pandemic. This is the third parliamentary election to be held in the country after the outbreak of armed conflict.

The ruling Ba'ath party, an ally of the Al-Asad family, won the legislative elections in July where they elected most of the 250 deputies to the National Assembly. Nine years after the start of the civil war, which has left over half a million dead and over six million refugees, the country is economically, socially and politically devastated and exhausted by the conflict. The Syrian pound has collapsed and lost much of its value, and this, added to the situation caused by the coronavirus pandemic and the US sanctions against Al-Asad's regime, has further weakened Syria's finances.