ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq - The UK Foreign Office on Tuesday announced that London has decided to remove the now-dissolved rebel group Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which in December toppled the Syrian regime, from its list of proscribed terrorist organizations, opening the path for greater cooperation with the current Syrian establishment.

“An order has been laid in Parliament to deproscribe Hay'at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), enabling closer engagement with the new Syrian government,” read a Foreign Office statement published Tuesday.

HTS, a group that emerged as a dominant player in the Syrian political landscape after it toppled the regime of Bashar al-Assad in a major offensive in December, had previously been designated as a terrorist organization by the US, the UK, the United Nations, and other Western nations.

The organization dissolved in January after assuming power, with its membership taking up positions in the new institutions of the post-revolutionary Syrian state.

The British move, according to the statement, is an initiative to make “closer engagement with the new Syrian government and support UK foreign and domestic priorities, from counter-terrorism to migration and chemical weapons destruction.”

The British move follows a similar action by US officials. 

In June, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio revoked the Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO) designation of HTS in a signed memo. 

The US government in 2018 announced a $10 million bounty for the group's leader, Abu Muhammed al-Jolani, who now uses his real name, Ahmed al-Sharaa.

Britain will “continue to press for genuine progress” and hold the Syrian government accountable for its actions in fighting terrorism and restoring stability, the Foreign Office statement added. 

It noted that Islamic State (ISIS) remains a “significant threat” in Syria, and the deproscription of HTS is expected to support the government’s counter-ISIS efforts, ultimately reducing the threat to Britain.

The deproscription of HTS will support “closer working with Syria to eliminate the former Assad regime’s chemical weapons programme,” the statement said. 

The government welcomed the Syrian president’s “commitment to destroy these weapons once and for all.”

The former UK Foreign Secretary visited Syria in July to make efforts to renew the diplomatic relationship between the two countries.

Sharaa joined al-Qaeda in Iraq in 2003 just weeks before the American invasion and quickly rose through the group’s ranks. He was arrested by US forces in Iraq in 2006 and imprisoned for over five years. His release in 2011 coincided with the start of the Syrian civil war, and he would go on to form Jabhat al-Nusra, the Syrian branch of al-Qaeda, after reaching an agreement with Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, Emir of the Islamic State (ISIS).