SHAFAQNA- Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad said Syria’s reconstruction will cost between $250 billion and $400 billion , Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Borisov has said after meeting with the Syrian head of state.
Borisov’s office said Thursday that the diplomat had discussed industrial, medical, and energy cooperation with Assad in Damascus on Thursday, as a years-long fight against foreign-backed terrorists nears its end.
“The range of questions discussed with the Syrian leader included political affairs, Russia’s participation in Syria’s postwar reconstruction and restoration of life to normal, and cooperation in industry, medicine, energy and other branches of the economy,” Borisov’s office said, press tv reported.
Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister said it was critical for Damascus to maximize the effectiveness of its planning by using the existing capacities in order to create the required financial and economic mechanisms.
“We’ve got to act fast, because any delays in economic recovery will be fraught with serious problems, including an upsurge in the activity of defeated terrorists. Extremists would find it far easier to recruit supporters from the class of impoverished people unable to support their families,” Borisov noted, Iran Press reported.
Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister leads a Russian delegation that is in Damascus for a meeting of the permanent Russian-Syrian commission for trading, economic, scientific and technical cooperation.
Syria has been able to purge Daesh and other terrorist groups from most of the country with support from Iran and Russia.
The Syria war, which began in March 2011, has killed hundreds of thousands of Syrians and dislocated thousands more while destroying most of the country’s infrastructure and industrial capacity.
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