Qatar reopened its embassy in Damascus on Saturday, 13 years after it closed early in Syria's civil conflict, as foreign governments moved to establish ties with the country's new rulers.
A journalist from a news agency observed Qatar's flag raised over the mission, making it the second nation, after Turkey, to officially reopen its embassy since Islamist-led rebels ousted president Bashar al-Assad earlier this month.
Unlike several other Arab governments, Qatar -- which supported opposition groups during Syria's civil war -- did not attempt to rehabilitate Assad before his removal.
Earlier on Saturday, workers swept the pavement, cleaned the area, and removed graffiti from the building's walls. One worker placed the Qatari flag at the base of the flagpole.
Doha sent a diplomatic delegation to Damascus several days earlier to meet with the transitional government. The mission expressed "Doha's full commitment to support the Syrian people", a Qatari diplomat told AFP.
On Tuesday, the European Union announced readiness to reopen its diplomatic mission in Damascus, while Britain, France, and the United States all sent delegations to the Syrian capital after Assad's overthrow.
The French flag was raised over Paris's embassy in Damascus on Tuesday, although the country's special envoy to Syria said the mission would remain closed "as long as security criteria were not met".
Meanwhile, the United States on Friday dropped a $10 million bounty it had issued years earlier on Ahmed al-Sharaa, Syria's new leader and the head of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham Islamist rebel group that led Assad's ouster.
HTS had its roots in Al-Qaeda but sought to moderate its image in recent years.
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