Deputy Minister Of Foreign Affairs Calls Russia's Transport Bashar Al-Assad The Safest Way

Bashar al-Assad. (Wikimedia Commons/Kremlin.ru)

JAKARTA - Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said that Moscow took ousted Syrian President Bashar al-Assad out of his country to Russia in the safest way so that he could arrive with his family safely.

Deputy Foreign Minister Ryabkov said that Russia provided shelter for Assad after he was ousted over the weekend, when rebel groups entered the capital Damascus, following a series of preliminary attacks in several regions of Syria.

"He was taken into custody, showing that Russia acted appropriately in such an extraordinary situation," he explained in an interview with NBC News, as quoted on December 11.

However, he was reluctant to elaborate further on the situation surrounding Assad, saying it would be a mistake to elaborate.

"I don't know what is happening to him at the moment," Ryabkov said, said Ryabkov, the first Russian official to confirm Assad's presence in Russia.

Asked whether Russia would hand over the ousted president to stand trial on charges ranging from torture to war crimes, Ryabkov said, "Russia is not a party to the convention that established the International Criminal Court."

Earlier, Assad and his family members had arrived in Moscow as Russia granted them asylum on humanitarian grounds, a Kremlin source told TASS.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the decision on asylum for Assad was made by President Vladimir Putin.

"Such a decision cannot be taken without the head of state. This is his decision," Peskov said but declined to elaborate, as quoted by Reuters.

It is known that, together with Iran, Russia has provided support for President Assad's government since the civil war broke out in 2011.