Syria’s de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa met with senior Christian clerics on Tuesday, amid calls on the Islamist chief to guarantee minority rights after seizing power earlier this month. Syria’s de facto leader meets minority Christians “The leader of the new Syrian administration, Ahmed al-Sharaa, meets a delegation from the Christian community in Damascus,” Syria’s General Command said in a statement on Telegram. The statement included pictures of the meeting with Catholic, Orthodox and Anglican clerics. Earlier Tuesday, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot called for an inclusive political transition in Syria that guarantees the rights of the country’s diverse communities. He expressed hope that “Syrians could take back control of their own destiny”. But for this to happen, the country needs “a political transition in Syria that includes all communities in their diversity, that upholds the most basic rights and fundamental freedoms,” Barrot told AFPTV during a visit to Lebanon with Defence Minister Sebastien Lecornu. Barrot and Lecornu also met Lebanon’s army chief Joseph Aoun and visited UN peacekeepers patrolling the southern border, where a …