Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa said Damascus is working to formally authorize Turkey’s remaining military presence in Syria through parliament, while predicting the country would soon no longer need foreign troops.

Speaking at an Atlantic Council event in New York on Tuesday on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, moderated by Brett McGurk, a former senior White House Middle East official who now serves as a distinguished fellow at the Atlantic Council, al-Sharaa said the number of Turkish bases in northwestern Syria had declined and that any foreign military presence should have the endorsement of the People’s Assembly.

“The Syrian state, I believe very soon will not have the necessity to have any military or foreign military presence,” he said.

WATCH NOW | Syrian President @AH_AlSharaa joins @brett_mcgurk for an #ACFrontPage event on Syria’s future, reconstruction, and regional role https://t.co/11R31HP2DU

— Atlantic Council (@AtlanticCouncil) September 22, 2026

The remarks shed light on the future of a military relationship that has made Turkey one of the closest regional partners of the government in Damascus since the ouster of Bashar al-Assad in December 2024.

Al-Sharaa said Turkey had intervened during the civil war because of concerns about security along its border.

Turkey has maintained troops in northern Syria since launching a series of cross-border operations beginning in 2016 against the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), which Ankara views as an extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).

The deployments also helped Turkey establish buffer zones along its border and support Syrian opposition forces. Turkish Defense Minister Yaşar Güler said in June 2025 that more than 20,000 Turkish troops were still deployed in Syria and that withdrawal would only be reconsidered once security and stability were restored

Al-Sharaa presented the changing Turkish presence as part of a broader effort to restore Syrian sovereignty while retaining military cooperation with foreign partners.

Asked by McGurk about Russian forces, al-Sharaa said Moscow’s military footprint had fallen from around 170 bases to two. Those remaining sites, he said, had been transformed into training facilities for the Syrian army and would not provide logistical support for operations against other countries.

“We are seeking not to have any foreign military bases in Syria and to have complete and pure sovereignty of the Syrian state,” he said, adding that a memorandum governing the remaining Russian presence was being implemented.

He also praised the withdrawal of US forces from Syria, calling it a safe departure carried out through an understanding and saying Syrian forces had taken control without creating the security vacuum some US officials had feared.

“The withdrawal was very safe and the region remained calm and no problems happened because of that vacuum,” al-Sharaa said.

That discussion led into another issue central to Turkey’s relationship with Damascus: the fate of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

On August 25, SDF commander Mazloum Abdi announced that the group would dissolve as an independent force after completing its integration into the Syrian army.

Al-Sharaa said the SDF had been integrated into state structures and “dismantled,” saying it was now operating under the Syrian state. His description reflects Damascus’ position on an integration process that had been under negotiation for months.

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan welcomed the SDF’s declaration of dissolution and integration during a September 13 visit to Damascus but said the commitment still had to be implemented on the ground.

Turkey has long viewed the SDF with suspicion because its main component, the YPG, is considered by Ankara to be the Syrian branch of the PKK, which has waged a decades-long insurgency against the Turkish state.

Ankara has also opposed the SDF maintaining a separate armed structure outside the control of Damascus.

Al-Sharaa drew a distinction between dismantling an armed organization and guaranteeing the rights of Syria’s Kurdish population, saying the SDF did not represent all Kurds.

He said a decree recognizing Kurdish cultural and linguistic rights would be incorporated into the country’s future constitution and that Education Ministry teams were working on implementation, including Kurdish-language education in Kurdish-majority areas.

“For sure, it will be part of the Constitution,” he said when asked whether those rights would receive constitutional protection.

Israel talks

Al-Sharaa also discussed negotiations with Israel, saying US-backed talks had at one point come close to an agreement before Israel pulled back.

“There were several sessions of negotiations with Israel, and we almost reached 90 percent of agreements,” al-Sharaa said, adding that Israel then pulled back for reasons it had given.

He said Syria was not currently talking about immediate lasting peace but wanted first to secure an Israeli withdrawal from territory occupied after Assad’s fall, followed by security arrangements.

“We can’t talk about peace if the rights of Syrians are usurped,” he said.

Al-Sharaa described a phased process in which Israel would first withdraw to positions held before December 8, 2024, after which the sides could discuss security arrangements and, if those succeeded, a more lasting peace.

Turkey has likewise backed security arrangements based on the 1974 disengagement framework and has repeatedly criticized Israeli military actions in Syria.

In August the Turkish Foreign Ministry condemned Israeli strikes on Syria’s Abu al-Duhur airbase, saying they violated Syrian sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Questions over his past and Syria’s transition

The discussion also turned to al-Sharaa’s former allegiance to al-Qaeda and the concentration of power during Syria’s transitional period.

McGurk pressed him twice about his previous pledge of allegiance to al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri. Al-Sharaa said he had addressed the issue before and argued that his political views had evolved, but he did not explicitly renounce the pledge during the exchange.

On Syria’s political transition, he said the People’s Assembly would review existing laws and oversee work on a new constitution before the end of the five-year transitional period.

He acknowledged shortcomings in the parliamentary elections but defended them as appropriate given the country’s circumstances.

Asked whether he would eventually seek the presidency through an election, al-Sharaa said he had not yet focused on the question.

“I haven’t thought about being elected. I still have three years in the transitional period,” he said.

But he left open the possibility of running.

“I will nominate myself” if carrying out the task required him to remain in office, he said, adding: “If I thought that I need to remain in power, I will stay there.”