Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu spoke Wednesday in response to journalists’ questions about Assad’s visit to Moscow. It was the Syrian leader’s first known trip abroad since the war broke out in 2011.
Davutoglu said: “If only he could stay in Moscow longer, to give the people of Syria some relief; in fact he should stay there so the transition can begin.”
Davutoglu also reiterated Turkey’s position that Assad should have no role in Syria’s future, insisting that efforts to find a solution to the Syrian crisis should focus “not on a transition with Assad, but on formulas for Assad’s departure.”
His comments came a day after Assad’s surprise visit to Moscow on Tuesday evening to thank Russia’s President Vladimir Putin for launching air strikes against Islamist militants in Syria

The Kremlin made the details of the visit public a day later, on Wednesday. It did not say whether Assad was still in Moscow or had returned to Syria.
The visit is believed to be Assad’s first foreign trip since the outbreak of the Syrian crisis in 2011 and comes three weeks after Russia launched a campaign of air strikes against Islamist militants in Syria on Sept. 30.