3 senior US diplomats in Syria

According to Reuters, senior US diplomats arrived in Damascus to meet with the new Syrian officials led by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS). This is the first face-to-face and official meeting between Washington and the new rulers of Syria.

Barbara Leaf, the US State Department's top diplomat for Middle East affairs, Roger Carstens, the White House representative, and Daniel Rubinstein, a senior adviser, are the first US diplomats to visit Syria since Bashar al-Assad stepped down.

The meeting takes place while Western governments are trying to raise the issue of removing the terrorist designation from the Tahrir al-Sham group.

Before the US delegation's visit, French and British officials had contacted the new Syrian rulers in recent days.

The United States severed diplomatic relations with Syria in 2012 and closed its embassy in Damascus.