ANTI-GOVERNMENT PROTESTS RAGE IN SYRIA’S SWEIDA PROVINCE AMID ECONOMIC HARDSHIP

Thu 10 February 2022:

In Syria’s southern province of Sweida, mass protests have been raging for days due to the country’s dismal economic state.

The Sweida demonstrations have now been ongoing for around a month, with much of the anger focusing on a government decision to exclude hundreds of thousands of people in the province from a subsidy programme.

The subsidy applied to ration cards which are used by millions of people in Syria. The government justified the cut saying it would instead aim to provide the subsidy to “more vulnerable people”.

Protestors shut off portions of the highways in Sweida, and videos of protesters blaming the government for the suffering circulated on social media.

Protests in #Suwayda countryside, south #Syria, block #Damascus-Suwayda Highway with burning tires.
Suwayda – Razan Zeinaddin – North Press pic.twitter.com/RViXbT2J3P

— NORTH PRESS AGENCY – ENGLISH (@NPA_English) February 6, 2022

Why are Syrians in the mainly Druze city of Sweida protesting against the Syrian regime? pic.twitter.com/ZXRLvA3A9u

— TRT World (@trtworld) February 7, 2022

Despite the nearly 11-year-long conflict, the government in Syria has managed to continue providing citizens with subsidized food and fuel, as well as health care.

However, due to the economic sanctions imposed by the United States and its Western allies on Syria, the insufficient subsidy compelled the authorities to come up with a mechanism to determine who is the most in need.

Many people in the province participated in the Syrian revolution in 2011, but as it developed into a civil war and the influence of hardline factions expanded, Sweida preferred to stand neutral.

Syria’s war has killed close to half a million people and spurred the largest conflict-induced displacement since World War II.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

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