Syrian PM Hijab defects

pressure the Syrian leadership faces from within.
The defection occurred as the embattled government has barely recovered from the last painful blow in July when four of its senior officers got killed in a bomb attack, experts say.
Jordanian government officials said Monday that the ex-Syrian prime minister defected along with his family to Jordan, although they later said the ex-official had not entered the Jordanian territory yet.
Hijab’s defection came out shortly after the Syrian government announced that he was sacked from his post without giving any clarification.
Soon after, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad issued two decrees. One relieving Hijab of his duties and the other assigning Omar Ghalawenji, deputy premier for services affairs and minister of the local administration, to replace Hijab in a caretaker government.
On June 6, Assad issued a decree entitling Riyad Hijab, the former agriculture minister, to form a new government. He announced the formation of his cabinet on June 23.
Hijab (46) is originally from the north eastern city of Deir Ezzour, which has been witnessing severe clashes between the Syrian forces and the rebels since the very beginning of unrest in the country. He was also a member of the Baath Party and served as the secretary general of the Arab Baath Party branch in Deir Ezzour.
His defection came amid unconfirmed news that three other cabinet ministers, including the ministers of finance and defence, accompanied him.
However, the Finance Minister Mohammad Jlailati was quick to deny the rumours. In a telephone call to the Syrian official TV, Jlailati said “I am a Syrian citizen before being a minister and I am talking from my office and practicing my job freely and transparently.” Meanwhile, Tehran says it will continue to back Syria under president Assad, which acts as a pillar of an Iranian-led regional alliance, top envoy Saeed Jalili told Assad in Damascus yesterday.
“What is happening in Syria is not an internal issue but a conflict between the axis of resistance on one hand, and the regional and global enemies of this axis on the other,” said Jalili, a top aide to Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Iran has accused Turkey and Gulf countries of arming the opposition in Syria, in collusion with the United States and Israel, to overthrow the regime of Tehran’s key ally, Assad.
In the same meeting, Assad said he was determined to crush the 17-month rebellion against his regime and cleanse the country of “terrorists,” according to state news agency SANA.
“The Syrian people and their government are determined to purge the country of terrorists and to fight terrorism without respite,” Assad told Jalili, visiting envoy of Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. —Xinhua/AFP.