The seriously ill Asma Assad, the wife of ousted Syrian President Bashar Assad, has been banned from entering the United Kingdom for cancer treatment, British government sources said, quoted by several newspapers, including the “Times“, BNR reported.
Government sources have confirmed that 49-year-old Asma Assad, who has dual Syrian and British citizenship, no longer has valid travel documents to the United Kingdom, as her passport expired in 2020.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper has made it clear that the government will not allow her to return to her native London, insisting that “decisions cannot be made solely on "on health grounds".
In 2012, Asma al-Assad was subject to sanctions by the UK and EU, including an asset freeze and a travel ban. She was accused of playing a key role in supporting her husband during the Syrian civil war. Foreign Secretary David Lammy also weighed in on the issue, telling MPs that she was "not welcome on the island".
There has been speculation that Asma al-Assad, who grew up in Acton, west London, is preparing to divorce her husband and return to the UK to continue her life-saving treatment for leukaemia. Her father, a cardiologist, has left his Harley Street clinic in London, in what is being interpreted as an attempt to look after his daughter, who now lives in Russia following the fall of the Syrian regime.