ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Hundreds of Syrian nationals living in Turkey, stood in long lines at the border crossings in southern Turkey, yearning to return to their homeland, following the collapse of Bashar al-Assad’s regime.
"The tyrant Bashar was killing and displacing people, that's why we fled," said Mohammed, a Syrian national who was at the border crossing waiting to return to Syria after years of displacement.
The Syrian nationals arrived at the Cilvegozu and Oncupinar border crossings at dawn, waiting impatiently for Turkish officials to check their documents before crossing the Bab al-Hawa and Bab al-Salameh gates on the Syrian side of the border.
Turkish authorities have not disclosed the number of Syrians that returned since the collapse of the Assad regime.
Turkey has been home to the largest number of Syrian refugees in the world, hosting an estimated 3.2 million registered Syrians.
Ankara has long been working to return the Syrian refugees to their homeland over the past few years amid economic challenges; however, it has faced backlash from humanitarian organizations, which had characterized the conditions in Syria as unsafe.
"My grandparents’ are in Syria, my uncles are in Syria. The rule of Bashar had ended. Now everyone can return to their countries," said Hozeifa, another young Syrian waiting at the border crossing along with his family,
Thousands of Syrian refugees on Sunday took to the streets in Istanbul and Ankara to celebrate the fall of Assad, some thanked Turkish President Recep Tayyib Erdogan for their warm welcome to the refugees fleeing war.
Hakan Fidan, Turkey's foreign minister, said on Monday that Ankara will work for the safe and voluntary return of Syrian refugees to their homeland.
He also said Turkey will help Syria in the reconstruction and will engage with all "regional actors" in that regard.
Syria’s civil war dramatically reignited late last month when a coalition of rebels led by the jihadist Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) launched a blistering offensive against the Syrian army, seizing the northern cities of Aleppo, Hama, Homs, and culminating their victory by capturing the capital, Damascus, as Assad fled to Moscow, ending over five decades of Baathist rule.
While Turkey has announced it had no role in the offensive that led to the fall of the Assad regime, it said on Sunday that it wanted the new government in Syria to be inclusive, with its future determined by the Syrian people.