Syria's Greek Orthodox celebrate Assad's victory in presidential election

Al-Suqaylabiyah Hama Syria Assad Greek Orthodox

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad won a fourth term in office with 95.1% of the votes.

Following Assad's victory, Syria's Greek Orthodox community went to the streets to celebrate.

In speaking to Greek City Times, Eli Khouri, a Rûm (Levantine Greek) from Homs, said "Assad is not an extremist and there is not a fear of the unknown with him."

"We're looking forward to the new Assad mandate so he can make institutional changes and update laws... to acknowledge us Rûms as Rûms and not as Arabs," he said.

"It's time to get rid of the Islamic laws for good and allow Christians to run for elections," Khouri stressed.

"We hope the new government strengthen its relations with Greece too," he concluded.

Assad's opponent Mahmoud Ahmad Marei received 3.3% of the vote and Abdullah Sallum Abdullah received 1.5%.

Despite Syrians in Turkish and U.S. occupied areas of the country being unable to vote, there was still a participation rate of 78.64%, higher than the 66.2% participation rate of the 2020 U.S. elections.

Representatives from the parliaments of Algeria, Oman, Mauritania, Russia, Iran, Armenia, China, Venezuela, Cuba, Belarus, South Africa, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Bolivia monitored and supervised the electoral process.

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