The Syrian businessman, Khaled Hboubati, who is close to the regime, has maintained his position as President of the Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC) for a new term from 2024 until 2028.
According to the organization’s announcement on Tuesday, March 5, a new executive board was elected, and pursuant to this, two deputies to Hboubati, a secretary of the organization, and two members of the executive office were named.
Hboubati was first appointed as President of the Red Crescent in December 2016 by a decision from the former Prime Minister of the regime, Imad Khamis, following the amendment of Article “20,” which granted the Prime Minister the right to choose one of the four candidates for the organization’s board of directors, even if that choice was from outside the board.
Hboubati’s appointment came as a replacement for Abdul Rahman Attar, who had spent more than 25 years in the position, following official orders for him to resign. At the time of his appointment, Hboubati was not a member of the executive office or the board of directors of the organization, nor even among its staff, according to a report by the Pro Justice organization.
Since Hboubati took over the presidency of the Red Crescent in 2016, the organization has been directly associated with the regime. It had lost any signs of independence after 2011, when the government of the regime indefinitely suspended the Red Crescent elections, got rid of independent management members, and dismissed the qualified staff, according to a report published by the American magazine, Foreign Affairs, in September 2018.
During his presidency, according to the report, the organization contributed indirectly to supporting the regime with approximately 30 billion dollars, spent on the salaries of its forces and the necessities of the intelligence apparatus, by leveraging the Red Crescent as an exclusive gateway to obtain aid funds. The regime’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs required all relief agencies to sign an agreement with the Red Crescent, considering it the official government partner.
As a reward for his support to the regime, Hboubati obtained a contract to formalize the Khirbet Ghazaleh crossing in Daraa in 2017, and compensation for the losses he suffered since the start of the revolution. His trade in the dried apricot product ‘Qamar al-Din’ in Eastern Ghouta ceased, and his “Damascus Casino” project closed in 2011, according to a study published in early 2020 by the Middle East Directions program, which is overseen by the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies (RSCAS) at the European University Institute.