Syria's exam season becomes a flashpoint in Sweida

Over 20,000 students in Sweida cannot sit their national exams at home. Damascus has designated exam centres only in its suburbs, and negotiations as well as UN mediation have both failed. The 9th-grade exams started on Wednesday. The crisis is now in its second year: last year's local exams were never recognised by Damascus following the July 2025 violence, which killed more than 1,700 people and displaced 200,000, according to the UN, and which has been described as involving potential war crimes. Students must sit the exams again elsewhere or risk losing another year. This week, one bus was shot at and pelted with rocks on the Damascus road. Armed groups have blocked teachers at checkpoints. Both sides—the interim government and Sweida factions—are blaming each other, while students are caught in the middle.