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Robert Ford

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Robert Ford

Syria after the overthrow of Bashar al Assad: What's next?

DATE: May 1, 2025 6:00 pm

LOCATION: World Trade Center, 401 E. Pratt Street, Baltimore, MD 21202

On May 1, we’ll welcome retired U.S. ambassador Robert Ford to speak to Baltimore Council members. His topic:  Syria after the overthrow of Bashar al Assad:  What’s next?

Robert Ford served as U.S. Ambassador to Syria from 2011 To 2014 at the time of the national uprising, the last of the mass protests during the Arab Spring. He was famous for his active engagement with the Syrian population, especially for his trip to the city of Hama in 2011 to meet with the nonviolent protesters. This earned him the enmity of the Assad regime – which mounted demonstrations against him and threatened his safety. He continued to meet Syrians at personal risk until the Obama administration closed the Embassy in February 2012.

But he kept up his ties to the Syrian opposition ever since, and when the regime fell last December, he was well plugged in with the force that took control, the HTS Islamist militia, headed by Ahmed al Sharaa.  Today Robert Ford remains one of the  top U.S. experts on Syria, making him especially well-placed to assess whether the new government can succeed  — and what sort of country is likely to emerge from the upheaval.

A career diplomat, he also served as Ambassador to Algeria and deputy Ambassador to Iraq, and he held important positions in Turkey, Egypt and Bahrain. Besides Arabic, he speaks German, Turkish and French. In 2012, he was awarded the Profile in Courage Award by the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation for his work in Syria. Despite “repeated threats to his life,” he continued “traveling around Syria to encourage and support peaceful protesters targeted by Assad’s brutal crackdown,” the tribute stated.

Ambassador Ford has addressed the Council twice before – in 2012 and 2014.

Please join us for an authoritative overview of Syria after the revolution on Thursday, May 1, at the World Trade Center top floor.

And, an advance notice: just two weeks later, on Thursday, May 15, we’ll host Brian Katulis of the Middle East Institute on a timely theme:  How has the Gaza war changed the Middle East?

Contact programs@bcfausa.org for more information or to register.

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