Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what contact, if any, they have had with the Assad regime in Syria over the last two months.

There has been no contact with the Asad regime over the last two months. Since the closure of the Syrian Embassy in London in August 2012, the British Government has had only limited contact with the Asad regime in relation to consular matters. The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth East (Mr Ellwood), wrote to the Syrian Foreign Minister in August 2015 about a consular case.