Assad’s critically ill wife ‘barred’ from returning to Britain for cancer treatment…

DAILY MAIL

The critically ill wife of the former Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad has reportedly been barred from returning to Britain for cancer treatment after her passport expired.

Asma al-Assad, 49, will be unable to come back to her native London without her official travel documents amid reports she is severely ill with leukemia and has only a ’50-50′ chance of survival.

It comes after her renowned cardiologist father, Fawaz Akhras, left his Harley Street clinic in what appears to be an effort to care for his daughter who fled to Russia following the collapse of her husband’s brutal regime.

Speculation has been swirling in recent days that Asma is looking to divorce Assad, and that she wants to return to Britain to continue her vital cancer treatment.

Whitehall sources, however, have confirmed that Asma, who also holds Syrian nationality, no longer possesses valid British travel documentation after her passport expired in 2020.

The home secretary Yvette Cooper has also stated that the government will not allow her to return to the country, as the decision ‘cannot be based solely on health reasons’.

Previously, the foreign secretary David Lammy, told MPs that Asma, who was born and raised in Acton, west London, is ‘not welcome here’.

Asma became Syria’s first lady in 2000 after marrying Assad, 59, , in Syria in the same year he took over control of the country, after the death of his father, Hafez al-Assad, who died aged 69.