BEIRUT (AP) — Syria’s embassy in Lebanon suspended consular services Saturday, a day after two relatives of deposed Syrian President Bashar Assad were arrested at the Beirut airport with allegedly forged passports.

Also on Saturday, Lebanese authorities handed over dozens of Syrians — including former officers in the Syrian army under Assad — to the new Syrian authorities after they were caught illegally entering Lebanon, a war monitor and Lebanese officials said.

The embassy announced on its Facebook page that consular work was suspended “until further notice” at the order of the Syrian foreign ministry. The announcement did not give a reason for the suspension.

Two Lebanese security officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly, said the suspension was ordered because the passports belonging to Assad’s relatives — the wife and daughter of one of his cousins — were believed to have been forged at the embassy.

Assad’s uncle, Rifaat Assad — who has been indicted in Switzerland on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity — had flown out the day before on his real passport and was not stopped, the officials said.

The U.K.-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported Saturday that 70 Syrians, including former army officers, were handed over by a Lebanese security delegation to the security forces of the new Syrian government, led by the former insurgent group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, or HTS. Three Lebanese judicial officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed the report.

Regional countries have been quick to establish ties with Syria’s new rulers. Delegations of Libyan and Bahraini officials arrived in Damascus on Saturday on official visits.

HTS leader Ahmad al-Sharaa, formerly known as Abu Mohammed al-Golani, has largely succeeded in calming fears within and outside of Syria that his group would unleash collective punishment against communities that supported Assad’s rule or attempt to impose strict Islamic law on the country’s religious minorities.

However, in recent days, sporadic clashes have broken out between the HTS-led security forces and pro-Assad armed groups. The country’s new security forces have launched a series of raids targeting officials affiliated with Assad and have set up checkpoints in areas with significant populations of the Alawite religious minority to which the former president belongs to search for weapons.

There have also been ongoing tensions and clashes in northeastern Syria between Kurdish-led forces and armed groups backed by Turkey. Many Kurds have viewed the new order in Damascus, which appears to have strengthened Turkey’s hand in Syria, with anxiety.

Ankara sees the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces — a key U.S. ally in the fight against the Islamic State group — as an affiliate of its sworn enemy, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, which it classifies as a terrorist organization.

The U.S. State Department said Saturday that Secretary of State Antony Blinken had spoken with Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan to “discuss the latest developments in Syria.”

“Secretary Blinken emphasized the need to support a Syrian-led and Syrian-owned political process that upholds human rights and prioritizes an inclusive and representative government,” the statement said, adding that they “also discussed the shared goal of preventing terrorism from endangering the security” of Turkey and Syria.

On Saturday, hundreds of protesters convened by Kurdish women’s groups participated in a demonstration in the northeastern city of Hasaka to demand women’s rights in the new Syria.

Perishan Ramadan, a participant from Hasaka, said the new government “is worse than Bashar” and that its leaders are Islamist extremists who “don’t accept any role for women.”

While the country’s new leaders have not attempted to impose Islamic dress or other conventions, it remains to be seen what role women will have in the new order and whether they will hold political or government positions.

“Women must be present in the new constitution for Syria,” said Rihan Loqo, spokeswoman for the Kongra Star women’s organization. ”… Women’s rights should not be ignored.”

Associated Press writers Hogir Abdo in Hasaka, Syria, and Ellen Knickmeyer in Washington contributed to this report.

DAMASCUS (AP) — Ousted Syrian leader Bashar Assad said Monday he wanted to stay in the country after rebels captured the capital, but the Russian military evacuated him from their base in western Syria after it came under attack.

They were Assad’s first public comments since he was overthrown by insurgent groups just over a week ago following a swift offensive that has shaken up the country’s alliances and led to celebrations in a nation long stifled by civil war.

Meanwhile, a spokesman for the new transitional government told The Associated Press that the new Syria will be inclusive and open to the world.

Assad said on Facebook that he left Damascus on the morning of Dec. 8, hours after insurgents stormed the capital. He said he left in coordination with Russian allies to their Hmeimim air base in the coastal province of Latakia, where he had planned to keep fighting.

But after the Russian base came under attack by drones, he said, the Russians decided to move him that night to Russia.

“At no point during these events did I consider stepping down or seeking refuge nor was such proposal made by any individual or party,” Assad said in the English text of his statement. “The only course of action was to continue fighting against the terrorist onslaught.”

In Damascus, residents dismissed Assad’s comments and some said he had abandoned Syria’s people long ago.

“Is he going to run away from us? He still won’t be able to run away from God,” said one resident, Moataz al-Ahmed, as children stepped on a fallen statue of Assad’s father, Hafez, who had begun the family’s half-century rule.

The spokesman for the transitional government’s political department said in an interview Monday that “the Assad regime is finished with no return” and Russia “should reconsider its presence on Syrian territory as well as its interests.”

The spokesman, Obeida Arnaout, told the AP that Syria has entered a new phase that will be open to the world, and the new government is looking to build good relations with its neighbors and beyond.

He also called on the U.S. and other countries to reconsider the designation of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham — the main rebel group and a former al-Qaida affiliate — as a terrorist organization, calling it “not right and not accurate” designation.

Already, the U.S. has said its officials have been in direct contact with the group.

Syria is home to multiple ethnic and religious communities, often pitted against each other by Assad’s state and years of war. Many of them fear the possibility that Sunni Islamist extremists will take over.

The new leadership also has been in contact with the U.S. to return American citizen Travis Timmerman, who was among the prisoners released from government detention centers when Assad fell, Arnaout said.

“There are political contacts at the highest levels in a way that benefits the Syrian people and that strengthen the current administration,” he said.

Asked whether the new government’s security forces would cooperate with the U.S. to combat remaining militants with the Islamic State group, Arnaout said Syrian factions have ousted and rejected IS and the group no longer has a significant presence in the country.

U.S.-backed, Kurdish-led forces in northeast Syria have been the main U.S. ally in fighting IS and oversee detention centers housing IS militants. However, the future of the Kurds and the semi-autonomous region they control is unclear in the country’s new post-Assad order. Clashes over territory have taken place in some areas between Kurdish forces and the armed groups that overthrew Assad.

Arnaout said the Kurds are part of the Syrian people and their rights will be protected. However, he said the new government will not accept that any part of Syria be outside of Damascus’ control.

“Kurds are one of the components of the Syrian people and we are very keen that this group has its rights protected,” he said. “The social fabric in Syria is a source of strength and not weakness. But we affirm that we don’t any part of Syria to be separated.”

The U.N. envoy for Syria, Geir Pedersen, said Monday he met with HTS leader Ahmed al-Sharaa and was briefed on the challenges and priorities of the Syrian people going forward. Pederson has called for the lifting of international sanctions on Syria to allow for faster rebuilding.

Meanwhile, a U.K.-based war monitor said Israeli airstrikes early Monday hit missile warehouses on the Syrian coast and called it the “most violent strikes” in that part of Syria since 2012.

Israel has been pounding with hundreds of airstrikes what it says are military sites in Syria after the dramatic collapse of Assad’s rule, wiping out air defenses and most of the arsenal of the former Syrian army.

Israeli troops have also seized a border buffer zone, sparking condemnation, with critics accusing Israel of violating the 1974 ceasefire and possibly exploiting the chaos in Syria for a land grab.