Damascus, Oct. 18 (SANA) President Ahmad al-Sharaa issued on Sunday two decrees appointing officials to senior positions in the country’s energy and economic sectors.
Decree No. 190 of 2026 appoints Maher Khalil al-Hassan as executive chairman of the Syrian Petroleum Company.
Decree No. 191 of 2026 appoints engineer Omar Samer al-Halabi as adviser for economic affairs to the Presidency of the Republic and chairman of the board of the Sovereign Fund.
The decrees stipulate that any provisions conflicting with them are repealed and that they take effect upon issuance.
Al-Hassan, an engineer born in Hama in 1971, previously served as minister of internal trade and consumer protection in the transitional government from December 2024 to March 2025. He has been deputy minister of economy and industry since late March 2025, overseeing domestic trade and consumer protection, the Syrian Trade Establishment and the development of digital systems for commercial registries and company departments.
Al-Halabi has more than 20 years of experience in economic policy, institution-building and sovereign investment across the Middle East and international markets. He previously served as a partner and head of economic consulting and public policy for the Middle East at KPMG, worked with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund and spent about a decade at Johnson Controls in strategy and business development roles.
He holds a bachelor’s degree in telecommunications engineering from Misr University for Science and Technology and an MBA with distinction from IE Business School in Madrid. He also studied public policy analysis at the London School of Economics and Political Science and completed executive programs at MIT Sloan School of Management, Harvard Business School and Fudan University in China.
The decrees repeal any provisions that conflict with them and take effect upon issuance.
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