The European Commission has invited Syria’s Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) administration to an official conference in Brussels after the slaughter of hundreds of Alawites in the country’s west.  

Anitta Hipper, the European Commission spokesperson, revealed at a daily press briefing that “an invite was sent” to HTS foreign minister Asaad al-Shaibani to attend the donor conference for Syria’s new rulers on March 17.

Titled ‘Standing with Syria: Meeting the Needs for a Successful Transition’, the donor conference – which the EU has been organizing annually since 2017 – is set to be the first held since the ouster of the Assad administration in December.

Hipper said the conference presents a “very important occasion” to engage with the new Syrian rulers.

HTS-led forces have over the past weeks perpetrated a vast array of massacres against minorities, especially Alawites, in the country’s northwestern coastal region.

More than 1,540 people, the majority of them civilians, have been killed so far in the violence in the provinces of Tartus, Latakia, Hama and Homs, according to the so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR).

In harsh rebuke of the massacres by HTS-led forces, human rights groups as well as the international community have called for an immediate halt to ethnic cleansing and sectarian-based atrocities in Syria.

They have also called for the establishment of an independent international investigation committee under the UN’s direct oversight.

EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas on Tuesday stopped short of condemning the killings and defended the deeds of HTS militants. 

“It is very, very early to tell whether this goes to the right direction. The first signals are good, but we are not rushing into any kind of arrangements yet, if we don’t have certainty,” she said. 

Kallas only expressed concern about the risks of sectarian violence in Syria and a resurgence of extremism in the Arab country

Earlier in the month, the United Kingdom announced the removal of 24 Syrian entities from the sanctions it had imposed during the Assad government.

The European Union also suspended sanctions imposed on Syria, including the energy, transportation, and financial institutions sectors that were essential for financial stability in the country.

Violence has surged in Syria under the HTS rule, with hundreds of kidnappings and extra-judicial killings reported since the fall of Assad’s government on December 8, 2024.

Most of the victims who were abducted or killed across Syria are members of the Alawite minority religious group, as acts of revenge continue in the Arab country.

The HTS had repeatedly claimed it would respect the rights of all sects and religions in Syria, but it was dramatically debunked last week after the rampant massacre of Syrian Alawites by its cadres.

Noticeably, the HTS regime in Damascus is not directing its efforts against Israeli occupation forces just 20 kilometers from the capital. 

Instead, its most keen target is Syria’s Alawite minority community, which faces abductions – sometimes in batches of five or 10 per day – executions, home invasions, and even forced humiliation, such as being ordered to bark like dogs. 

While the HTS administration claims its killing operations target “remnants of the old regime,” the military crackdown on Alawites that started in early March quickly has descended into open massacres of civilians.

According toSOHR, at least 973 Alawite civilians were slaughtered on March 10 alone.