Dishonesty in Syria

It was at least 2 hours before the marina staff arrived at our boat with a group of officials. They informed us that we would have to leave immediately. The officials were reluctant to provide an explanation. After we pressed the most senior man to give a reason he said that we had not radioed the port when we entered Syrian waters. We told him that this was not correct; Nic had contacted the port 5 times on our approach. This was never mentioned again.

We discussed the situation with Maissa from the marina. She assured us that we had done nothing incorrect or illegal. We also tried to explain to the officials that:

• We had fulfilled their instructions to sail to a Turkish port to obtain the paperwork they wanted.


• In doing so we had experienced a difficult return passage to Latakia.


• We had no more than 1 or 2 hours sleep in the last 32 hours.


• We had not eaten since 21:00 the previous night.


• Our next planned port of call was Alexandria, Egypt, almost 500 miles away (a minimum of 5 days and 5 nights continuous sailing).


• We would need to refuel for such a long passage.


• We had no weather information.


• We did not have enough food and drinking water on board for a long passage.


• We had made no passage plan to such a distant port.


• We had still not had the opportunity to make necessary repairs to the boat that were outstanding when we arrived in Latakia on 7^th June.

For all of these reasons to depart immediately would put us and Irony at risk. The officials were utterly unsympathetic and insisted we leave immediately unwilling to consider the dangers in such a situation. Nic told them we would require an extra crew and compensation for their sending us on a three day, 200 mile round trip when we were already exhausted and now wanted to send us out again .They laughed and said that we had entered illegally (blatantly untrue) and therefore had no rights. The discussions continued and a vehicle was brought to the quay and we were advised that if we did not leave the situation would “escalate”. The implication was that we would be arrested.

We continued to ask what we had done wrong. The next reason given was that we had not notified them of our arrival 24 hours in advance. This was also untrue; we emailed the Syrian Yacht Club on Saturday evening and have a reply from Maissa welcoming us again to Syria! Apparently Maissa did not manage to get the required form to the officials until Monday morning, their fax was broken which they did not deny. Clearly this was not our fault.

We also continued to ask why we were instructed to make a 200 mile round trip to Turkey for exit papers if they were still going to refuse us entry. They said it was our choice. This is utterly inaccurate. Maissa confirmed they were lying but nothing was documented. The 10 or so officials present quite clearly told us on Thursday 7^th that we should go to Iskenderum in Turkey and return with exit papers. Nic made a point of confirming it several times with several officials because of how ridiculous it seemed. It was not our idea to make a journey of 200 miles to get a rubber stamp. Despite our 3 day trip to comply with their requirement no one ever asked to see the exit paper we obtained in Mersin!

We telephoned the British consul in Damascus who told me they were unable to help as they did not have an office in Latakia. The marina brought their lawyer into the discussions, to no avail.

I asked to speak to the person giving the directive for us to leave, requesting the opportunity to put our case to him face to face or on the telephone as a reasonable man. I was refused, he was too important.

Finally we persuaded them to bring a tanker to refuel. The marina office provided some weather information which showed that the wind was not favourable for us to reach our next port of call. 2 guards were posted by our boat.

Eventually I managed to speak to the Syrian Consul in London, Mr Loutfi, and explain our situation to him. It was only his kind intervention that resulted in some humanity being shown and we were allowed to stay the night and they offered to get us provisions.

We left Latakia on Tuesday morning 12^th June,

It is now obvious that we were never going to be allowed entry. It is quite dishonest and disgraceful that we were not advised this on our first arrival. To tell us to make a 200 mile journey under false pretences is dishonourable and dangerous.

We cannot find words to express our outrage at this experience. We have been planning our visit to Syria for some time and had obtained our visas at the Syrian Embassy in London in February this year. We have long been looking forward to exploring the country. We certainly did not expect to be treated like criminals and liars especially after having made such an enormous effort. We are very sad to be left with the impression that the Syrian people are not honourable and do not keep their word but worst of all they have no regard for the safety of a ship and her crew, contrary to all international norms.

We have been treated as if we are a commercial ship not a pleasure craft, our crime was anchoring and not obtaining receipts! It would appear that the underlying problem, despite our written assurances to the contrary, was that we might have taken our boat to Israel after leaving Rhodes. This is utterly ridiculous and paranoid as it is almost a 600 mile direct passage and inconceivable for us to undertake with Michele's injury.

The irony of the situation is that we could take our boat to Israel where we can travel overland to Jordan and can enter Syria from there.