Trump announces plan to lift sanctions on Syria

President Trump said he is ordering the cessation of sanctions against Syria to “give them a chance at greatness.”

“The sanctions were brutal and crippling and served as an important, really an important function, nevertheless, at the time, but now it’s their time to shine,” Mr. Trump said in his speech at the U.S.-Saudi Investment Summit on Tuesday in Riyadh.

He said he made the decision after discussing it with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

“Oh what I do for the crown prince,” Mr. Trump said, laughing.

The room filled with applause as he announced the cessation.

“It’s their time to shine. We’re taking them all off, and they’re going to have — I think they’re going to have based on the people and the spirit and everything else that I’m hearing about — so I say, good luck Syria,” he said. “Show us something very special, like they’ve done, frankly, in Saudi Arabia.”

The White House said Tuesday that Mr. Trump agreed to say hello to Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa Wednesday while in Riyadh.

This would mark the first meeting between U.S. and Syrian presidents in 25 years. The last meeting was between Bill Clinton and Syria’s Hafez al Assad in Geneva in May 2000.

Syria had a turnover in leadership after the fall of President Bashar al Assad in December.

Some lawmakers criticized the way Mr. Trump went about the announcement. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Massachusetts Democrat, said she and Rep. Joe Wilson, South Carolina Republican, have been “pushing President Trump to update our broad and outdated Syria sanctions that, if left in place, will harm U.S. interests and the Syrian people.”

She said the administration should take “concrete steps we laid out – or risk walking away from an opportunity to promote stability in the region and help the Syrian people build a better life after years of living under the thumb of the oppressive and brutal Assad regime.”