Iran and Syria Look to Closer Ties

Visa move aimed at improving relations at a human level but obstacles remain.

The busy historic market of Damascus is a familiar sight for Siya Shahidi. The Iranian housewife and mother of three has been coming here from Tehran at least twice a year for years with her family to shop and visit holy sites.

“When I walk in this market, it feels like walking in Tehran,” said Shahidi, whose head is only partly covered by a black scarf as she browses colourful dresses in a small store at the Hamidiyeh souk in old Damascus.

Shahidi, who considers Damascus “the cheapest and closest city” to Tehran, is one of hundreds of thousands of Iranians who visit Syria every year for religious tourism, recreation or business. Their growing numbers reflects the close political and strategic ties between the Iranian and Syrian leadership.

Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made a ceremonial appearance in Damascus on February 25 with his Syrian counterpart, Bashar al-Assad. The mini-summit between the two presidents was an apparent assertion of the robustness of bilateral relations in the face of continuing calls from the United States and the West for Damascus to sever its ties with Tehran.

In the past year, Washington has started a dialogue with the Syrian government hoping to lure it into weakening its support for anti-Israeli militant groups in Lebanon and Gaza, which are heavily backed by the Iranians.

Washington declared recently that it would be dispatching Robert Ford as its new ambassador to Damascus after a five-year hiatus.

But many critics feel that the new American policy at a time when the US pushes for peace talks between Israel and Syria does not present enough incentive to drive Syria away from its regional ally Iran.

The US maintains sanctions against Syria that were imposed in 2004 and the peace process is stalled, for which the Syrians blame Israel and its American supporters.

“I don’t think it’s in anybody’s best interest for [the Syrian-Iranian] relationship to dissolve. On the contrary, I see it as a blessing in disguise for the international community,” said Sami Moubayed, a Damascus-based political analyst and editor in chief of Forward magazine, an English language Syrian publication.

He said that Damascus had proved to be a “good negotiator” and could be a mediator between Iran and the West.

“I find it strange that they [the US] talk about Middle East stability and at the same time talk about dividing two countries,” Assad told reporters at his joint news conference with Ahmadinejad.

Moubayed said that Damascus wanted to send out a double message, first that it is not ready to break an alliance “based on mutual interests and vision” and, second, that the Syrians could continue to maintain good relations with the West while maintaining strong ties with Iran.

But beyond its political dimension, the meeting led to the elimination of visa requirements between the two countries in a bid to consolidate relations at a popular level.

Some say that this move will increase the number of Iranian visitors coming to Syria, estimated to be 500,000 a year now and rising.

Few, however, go in the other direction.

In Damascus old town, it is common to hear vendors using Farsi as they welcome Iranian customers and bargain over Syrian-made clothes and lingerie. Some shops have Farsi on their signs and sellers usually accept the Iranian rial.

Some restaurants and shops even hang photos of Ahmadinejad.

Ahmed Zaher el-Ban, owner of a clothing store at the Hamidiyeh souk in central Damascus, said that his business relies a lot on Iranian tourists and businessmen who export his products to Iran.

“I made friends with a lot of Iranian customers. They call me from Tehran at Eid (Muslim religious feasts),” Ahmed, who speaks Farsi fluently, said.

But some experts say that Syrian-Iranian economic relations are weak.

Ayman Kahef, an economist and editor in chief of the Syrian Days news website, believes that cancelling the visa requirement will have a positive effect on trade, investment and tourism for both countries.

Iranian vice-president Parviz Davoudi said during a visit to Syria this month that trade in goods between the two countries was about 300 million US dollars a year, while tourism generated 500 million dollars.

For Kahef, bilateral economic cooperation remains relatively low. He said “logistical obstacles” have played a fundamental role in slowing down the exchange of goods between the two countries, which on land are separated by Turkey and Iraq.

“The difficult topography of Turkey in addition to the unstable security situation in Iraq hinder trade routes,” he said.

Other observers say that at the cultural level, there are many barriers that complicate human contacts between Syrians and Iranians.

Although both countries are overwhelmingly Muslim, each predominantly observes a different branch of Islam, Shiism for Iran and Sunnism for Syria. Each country speaks a different language and Iran is a theocracy while Syria follows a secular political system.

Most of the Iranians who flock to Damascus are observant Shia on a pilgrimage to religious sites like the mosque of Sayida Zainab, the daughter of Imam Ali and granddaughter of the prophet Mohammad.

This limits the type of contact between the people from the two nations.

There are also less conservative Iranian tourists who come to escape the restrictive atmosphere of their country and enjoy the more relaxed social codes in Syria where drinking alcohol, for instance, is permitted.

Ali Shaheen, an Iranian engineer, chose Damascus for his honeymoon with his wife Surraia.

“Although it’s an Islamic country like Iran, it has many more entertainment options and places to visit,” he said sitting at a restaurant in the downtown area of Damascus.

Amir Bari, a vendor from northern Iran on a visit to Syria, agrees.

“I love this city … There are shrines, mosques and bars, I can go to the bar without being arrested …There are no revolutionary guards here,” he said.