Asma al-Assad with her husband Bashar, the former president of Syria. Photo: AFP PHOTO / HO / SANA
A now-infamous 2011 Vogue profile of Asma al-Assad, the wife of toppled Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad, reads like, well, a Vogue profile.
Her neck is described as "long." Her grace is "energetic." Her shoes show a "flash of red soles," a trademark of luxury shoemaker Christian Louboutin.
The article has since been removed from Vogue's website after it was widely criticised for trivialising the regime and Asma's role in it. Its headline "Rose in the Desert" hints at the hope Syria's critics had that Asma would somehow tame her husband, who followed in the footsteps of his father's brutal rule.
Now, the al-Assad family have fled to Russia after rebel forces stormed the Syrian capital of Damascus earlier this week, effectively ending 13 years of civil war. The dictator and his wife have found solace with their long-term ally Russian President Vladimir Putin, who supported the regime and has strategic Russian military bases in Syria.
So, what is next for Asma and her exile in Russia?
Martin Fletcher, veteran foreign correspondent tells Sunday Morning's Jim Mora that her life will now be bleak, not unlike the state of the country she has fled.
"She is subject to a travel ban and asset freeze. The British government has made it clear that Asma is not welcomed back in Britain. So she is going to lead a fairly constricted life from now on."
Who is Asma al-Assad?
The 49-year-old was born in London to a cardiologist and a diplomat mother, both Sunni Muslims. She has a degree in computer science and worked in London's banking sector for JP Morgan when she began dating Bashar, who was a family friend.
When she left London for Syria in 2000, she had been accepted into the MBA program at Harvard. After her wedding, she travelled around Syria incognito for three months to learn about the country and focused on charity work.
"She appeared to take her progressive, liberal, western values with her, but how much of that was a sham? How much of that was for show? Certainly, some of it was."
What was her life in Syria like?
Asma gave off Princess Diana vibes. She drove herself around Damascus and was often seen picking her three children up from a Montessori school. At that time, the family lived in a more modest three-story house, rather than the billion dollar presidential palace built by Saudi Arabia.
"It's a pretty bleak echoey place. It is not a place a normal family would want to live," said Fletcher, who has visited the palace.
President Bashar al-Assad and wife Asma casting votes at a polling station in Malik. Photo: AFP / The official Facebook page of the Syrian Presidency
Asma didn't just fool a Vogue writer. The newlyweds travelled to England and met the late Queen Elizabeth II. They were welcomed to Paris by President of France Jacques Chirac. They attended the funeral of Pope John Paul II in 2005.
"They were helped by very costly Western PR companies.... She was very much the face of Syria the regime wanted to put forward."
When did things go south?
Asma seemed to morph from the Syrian equivalent of Princess Diana into Marie Antoinette.
"I think she probably did think when she married Bashar that she could make a difference. She could do good, but it didn't last very long."
It's near impossible for Asma to have not known the dark history of the al-Assad family as some of her apologists claim, said Fletcher.
"You didn't just marry Bashar. You marry the regime and all that went with it."
The shattering of her already-shaky image from a Western point of view came in 2012, a year into the rebel uprising against the regime. Opposition activists released a cache of emails from Asma and her husband detailing their shopping habits.
"What do they show that as her country is literally burning, as her husband's warplanes are reducing towns and cities to rubble, she is buying top-end luxury goods from London and Paris through an intermediary, which I think says a lot."
By 2020, she was personally sanctioned by the US for her role in the Syrian regime. Instead of turning to Western news outlets, she started going on Russian television.
What will her life in exile look like?
"The one thing they won't be in exile in Moscow is poor."
The US State Department estimates the family have accrued between one and two billion dollars, according to Fletcher.
Travel opportunities will be rare. Asma would be arrested if she set foot in Europe, the US and its allies. She would be in danger in almost all Middle Eastern nations except Iran, a key supporter of the al-Assad regime.
Asma is a breast cancer survivor. Earlier in 2024, the regime announced that Asma was battling a form of leukaemia. As far as we know, she is still undergoing treatment.
Her three children - now in their teens and early 20s - are with her in Russia. One is studying at university there.
"[The children's] lives will be tarnished. Their lives will be blighted," said Fletcher.
He described Russia as a bleak prison for them, living life at the mercy of Putin, who has little use for them now they have left Syria.
"It is quite a price they are going to pay."
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