A year after fleeing Syria, Assad lives protected in Moscow as Putin’s bargaining chip

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Since his arrival, no photos of him or his relatives have been published, Assad has not met with political leaders – including Putin – nor has he made any public statements about the direction of the Arab nation. Even when the forces of the new government were accused in March of having massacred the Alawite religious minority, of which he is a member, Assad did not break his silence. A week ago, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said he “could not share any information on this,” in response to the former dictator’s life in his country.

— Relations between Moscow and the Assad family are deeply structured by long-term strategic interests, dating back to Syria’s alignment with the Soviet Union during the Cold War — Amanda Marini, professor of contemporary international politics at PUC-PR, told GLOBO — Under Hafez al-Assad, Bashar’s father, Syria became a fundamental pillar of the Soviet presence in the Middle East, benefiting from military assistance, security cooperation and infrastructure agreements.

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According to the German newspaper Zeit, the world of Assad and those close to him today is limited to a wealthy region of the Russian capital, Moscow City, where futuristic towers with metal details seem centuries removed from the historic buildings in the center. According to the Financial Times newspaper, relatives of the “Butcher of Syria” purchased around 20 units in a complex known as Capital City for $40 million (220 million reais) between 2013 and 2019. A real estate agent who took Zeit to visit the site did not mention Assad, but said “several politicians, including foreigners,” lived there.

A close aide revealed to the German newspaper that Assad, an ophthalmologist who came to power after the death of his father, spends his days playing video games or strolling through a nearby luxury shopping center and often visits his dacha, a traditional Russian country house, on the outskirts of Moscow. His wife, Asma, faces difficult cancer treatment: a year ago she was diagnosed with leukemia and doctors told her she had little chance of surviving. Turkish media revealed that the couple was considering divorce, which the Kremlin denied. In February, in a story attributed to her in X, she wished the people “security and prosperity”.

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The family’s security is provided by the Federal Security Service (FSB), responsible for protecting other politicians who have fled their country: one of them is Viktor Yanukovych, former pro-Moscow Ukrainian president who fled after a popular uprising which caused civil war in the neighboring country.

— Keeping Assad under protection even after the capture of Damascus and his subsequent exile has strong geopolitical value, explains Marini. — For Russia, this is a clear sign of continuity: Moscow wants to reaffirm that it is not abandoning its allies, even in the face of defeats considered definitive. This position strengthens Russia’s credibility with its partners.

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One of the rare glimpses into the family’s life came in February, when one of Bashar’s sons, Hafez, posted a video on In other posts that same month, he said that Assad’s entourage had been surprised by the advance of rebel militias and that a Russian officer had ordered the family to leave Damascus on December 8. First to the Hmeimim base, operated by Russia, then to Moscow.

In his publications, he assured that “there was never a plan B to leave Damascus, much less Syria”. But reality tells a completely different story. In 2019, in revealing the purchase of properties, the Financial Times cited a series of complex transactions involving shell companies, cash payments and loans that were not transparent. In addition to guaranteeing a home in the event of eventual exile, it was a way of keeping money diverted from the Syrian state beyond the reach of international capital control bodies, as well as Western sanctions.

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According to the newspaper, the regime transported $250 million (around 1.37 billion reais) to Moscow, in $100 and 500 euro notes, during trips made on regime planes between 2018 and 2019. Without access to the international banking system, the money was used to pay debts to Russians and also, according to the investigation, real estate investments.

Days before the regime’s fall, Reuters showed that Assad’s allies made at least four trips aboard a chartered plane to the United Arab Emirates, taking $500,000 (2.75 million reais) in cash, documents and computers containing information about the business network run by the family. While the rebels were already circulating around Damascus, the plane stopped at Hmeimim, where Assad was taking refuge.

Alongside a decades-long crackdown on his opponents and a war against the country that has cost more than half a million lives, Assad and his family have used the Syrian state to enrich themselves. Conservative estimates indicate that the former dictator’s fortune was between 1 and 2 billion US dollars (between 5.5 and 11 billion reais), relying on a vast network of properties and gold bars hidden across the planet.

The regime was also accused of turning the country into a production and distribution point for Captagon, a popular stimulant in the Middle East, whose exports generated up to US$7 billion (38.5 billion reais) a year. Much of this money went to the former dictator’s accounts.

Figures which contrast with the image that the regime wanted to give to the population. Assad’s children attended normal schools, the family drove ordinary cars and rarely showed even the slightest hint of wealth. As the Assads were en route to Russia, crowds that invaded official residences found themselves faced with marble walls, works of art worth more than the combined revenues of entire cities, and garages full of luxury vehicles.

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A year after the fall, and with the country still searching for a new path, Syrian authorities now want Assad extradited to face local justice for his war crimes, which has virtually no chance of happening. And not just because of Russia’s refusal to extradite a longtime ally.

— Your presence in Moscow functions as an instrument of indirect pressure on the new Syrian government. The implicit message is that the Kremlin still has privileged access to a symbol of the previous order and, therefore, the possibility of interfering in Syria’s political future if it deems it necessary, Marini says. — Assad becomes a bargaining chip, whose usefulness can be mobilized in discussions relating to the maintenance of the Russian military presence, notably at the Tartous base, security agreements, air authorizations or strategic economic concessions.

On another front, they are trying to repatriate millions of dollars of the former dictator’s fortune scattered around the world. Authorities in the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Spain and France have already identified accounts and assets associated with the family, but the process of transferring the money to the Syrian state is lengthy.

— Syria’s reconstruction will likely depend more on new strategic partnerships, an influx of foreign capital and continued investment than on a possible recovery of the wealth accumulated by the former regime.