Syria to select post-Assad parliamentary members in process deemed undemocratic
A third of the members are appointed by interim leader Ahmed al-Sharaa, who has said it is impossible to hold direct elections now
According to the organising committee, more than 1,500 candidates – just 14 per cent of them women – are running for the assembly, which will have a renewable 30-month mandate.
Sharaa is to appoint 70 representatives out of the 210-member body.
The other two-thirds will be selected by local committees appointed by the electoral commission, which itself was appointed by Sharaa.
But southern Syria’s Druze-majority Sweida province, which suffered sectarian bloodshed in July, and the country’s Kurdish-held northeast are excluded from the process for now as they are outside Damascus’s control, and their 32 seats will remain empty.