Why Moscow is scaling back its presence in Qamishli, a key military facility in northeastern Syria

Russia has begun withdrawing troops and equipment from Qamishli Airport in northeastern Syria, where its units have been stationed since 2019, Reuters reported on Monday. The process, which began last week, will see some personnel transferred to Russia’s Hmeimim Airbase in western Syria, while the remainder will return to Russia.

A source in the Syrian security services told Reuters that Russian military equipment and heavy weapons had been sent from Qamishli to Hmeimim in recent days, though Russian flags were still flying over Qamishli Airport on Monday, and two aircraft bearing Russian markings were seen on the runway

Base abandoned

Correspondents from the Associated Press (AP) visiting the Russian base near the airport found that the facility was already being guarded by Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a pro-Kurdish alliance of armed groups in the northeast of the country. Members of the SDF claim that the Russian military has been removing equipment for the past few days.

AP said the living quarters at the base looked virtually empty and that only a few items had been left behind. One SDF fighter told AP that the evacuation had begun five or six days earlier, with the equipment moved by cargo plane, but said it was unclear whether the cargo plane had gone to Russia or to Hmeimim.

AL-Monitor, a Washington-based independent news outlet specialising in the Middle East, confirmed reports that Russia was cutting back on its presence in the region, publishing similar footage that it said confirmed Russia’s withdrawal from the airbase, despite showing Russian flags still fluttering over the communication tower.

Russian business daily Kommersant previously reported that the transitional Syrian authorities were expected to ask the Russian military to vacate Qamishli Airport, though most likely only after Damascus had successfully recaptured Syria’s northeastern Hasakah province from the SDF. “They have no business there now,” a Syrian source said of Russian servicemen in the area.

A Syrian foothold

In 2019, Timur Khodzhaev, the head of Russian Aerospace Forces in Qamishli, said that Moscow had allocated military police, air defence systems and armoured vehicles to the facility. The Russian military police continued to work in the area even after the collapse of the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Damascus on 8 December 2024, with Russian patrols observed near Qamishli within days of a two-day visit to Moscow last summer by Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad al-Shaibani. Syrian media reported at the time that Moscow had increased its military presence in Qamishli.

Though it may now be vacating Qamishli, Russia continues to have a significant military presence in Syria, operating both the Hmeimim Airbase, and a naval base in Tartus, further south. However, the future of both facilities has been uncertain since the fall of the Assad regime.

There is no publicly available data on the exact number of Russian troops still in Syria, military observer David Sharp told Novaya Europe, adding that he believed there would still be “a small number of Russian soldiers in the country, numbering anywhere from several hundred up to 1,000.”

"They are mainly there to guard the military bases, equipment, machinery and themselves. Technical staff ensure the takeoff and landing of aircraft, as well as the dispatch and reception of ships,” Sharp added.

BBC News Russian military analyst Iya Barabanov told Novaya Europe that the number of Russians voting in Russian elections and referendums from Syria had grown steadily between 2016 and 2024 from about 4,500 to about 7,500.

“Clearly most of them were in the military. After the overthrow of Bashar al-Assad, most soldiers were relocated from Syria. How many remain is unknown. But we do know that, following the change of regime in the country, some military equipment was shipped to the Libyan port of Tobruk, and from there, apparently, handed to the Africa Corps,” Barabanov said, referring to the paramilitary structure set up by the Russian Defence Ministry to protect Russian military and economic interests in Mali.

The Hmeimim airbase and naval base at Tartus could be used as transshipment points to supply the Africa Corps, Sharp believes, adding that the Russian military was not currently assigned to any active combat missions in Syria.

Influence games

The presence in Qamishli was initially seen as an attempt to contain Turkish influence and protect Kurdish forces, but once power changed hands in Damascus, the base became unnecessary.

Though Qamishli is the smallest of the Russian military bases in Syria, the Russian withdrawal is significant as it suggests that the Kremlin’s efforts to maintain its presence in Syria — and thus its strategically valuable military foothold in the Middle East — under the transitional government of acting Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa has not yet produced results.

Russia’s continued presence at its two other military bases in Syria topped the agenda in Sharaa’s meeting with Putin on Wednesday, his second since he came to power. The Syrian government is continuing its efforts to negotiate Assad’s return from Russia, where he and his family fled in December 2024 after his 24-year rule was brought to a sudden end by rebel groups under Sharaa’s command.

The question of Assad’s future has become an increasingly sensitive one for the Kremlin amid growing calls for his extradition. In September, a Damascus court issued an arrest warrant for the ousted dictator on charges of murder and torture, though Putin is extremely unlikely to give up his long-time ally, to whom he granted political asylum.