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Assad’s regime sees its first high-level defection
Syrian deputy oil Minister Abdo Hussameldin has defected from President Bahsad al-Assad’s regime, becoming the first high-ranking official to abandon the Syrian government and join the opposition.
Abdo Hussameldin has defected from President Bahsad al-Assads regime
The deputy oil minister from Syria, Abdo Hussameldin, defected from al-Assad's regime and announced his defection in a video. According to AFP, the opposition held arrange his resignation.
"I Abdo Hussameldin, deputy oil and mineral wealth minister in Syria, announce my defection from the regime, resignation from my position and withdrawal from the Baath Party," Hussameldin said in the video.
"I join the revolution of this dignified people," he said, adding that he had been in government for 33 years, but did not want to retire, "serving the crimes of this regime."
"I have preferred to do what is right although I know that this regime will burn my house and persecute my family," Hussameldin said.
Hussameldin said the regime had inflicted great sorrow and sadness and that it had denied the basic life and humanity, driving Syria "to the edge of the abyss".
Assad had appointed the now former deputy oil minister through a presidential decree in 2009.
