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Syria Launches Seven Tenders to Rebuild M5 and Key Highways

SP Today News Desk

Syria opened seven tenders to domestic and international bidders to rehabilitate the M5 corridor and other main routes, and is studying toll highways built under BOT concessions to link the country with its neighbors.

Seven Tenders Opened

Syria's Ministry of Transport has launched seven tender announcements inviting domestic and international companies to bid on strategic projects to rehabilitate the country's international road network. Transport Minister Yarub Badr announced the tenders at a press conference on 14 July 2026.

The minister said the work forms part of an infrastructure development plan to strengthen connections between the country's provinces, and that opening it to domestic and international bidders would bring private and foreign investment into the sector.

The M5 Corridor

Several of the projects target the M5 corridor, which runs between the Turkish and Jordanian borders. They include rehabilitating the Nasib–Damascus, Damascus–Homs, and Homs–Aleppo roads, along with the Saraqeb–Idlib section.

The minister said opening the work to external bidders would secure the highest technical specifications and draw on international experience in construction and supervision.

New Dual Highways

Two further projects would add a second lane to the Damascus–Tadmur and Tadmur–Deir ez-Zor roads, converting them into dual highways toward the country's east. Two additional announcements seek international consulting firms to supervise the rehabilitation and construction work.

The stated goals are to accelerate the rehabilitation of the international road network, connect various Syrian regions, and transfer engineering expertise to national agencies.

Toll Roads and Neighbors

Alongside the tenders, the General Institution for Road Transport is updating economic feasibility studies for north–south and east–west routes that could be converted into toll roads.

Its director, Muaz Najjar, said these would be developed under international build-operate-transfer (BOT) investment arrangements, with the aim of linking Syria to neighboring countries through commercially financed highways.

Connecting the Regions

The ministry framed the program as a way to reconnect Syrian regions and to bring the main corridors up to international specifications.

Drawing on foreign contractors and consultants, officials said, would let the work proceed to a common technical standard while building local engineering capacity for the projects that follow.

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