Background
Faisal Mekdad was born in the village of Ghasm in Daraa Governorate in 1954.
Faisal Mekdad was born in the village of Ghasm in Daraa Governorate in 1954.
He graduated in 1978 from Damascus University with a degree in English. He later got his Doctor of Philosophy in English Literature from Charles University in Prague in 1993.
While at Charles University, he was a part of the International Union of Students. Mekdad has denied accusations of his government"s alleged crackdown on protesters after the start of the Syrian Civil War. He has held interviews with Western and Arab Media outlets about the uprising, where he has spoken in support of Bashar al-Assad.
The other members with him were Bashar Jaafari, Omran al-Zoubi, Bouthaina Shaaban, Walid Muallem, and Luna Shabal.
During the Geneva Conference, Mekdad held press conferences where he denied accusations by the Syrian National Coalition that his government was holding children in their prisons. Also during the Geneva conference, Mekdad was infuriated by questions by an Orient television reporter, he told the reporter, "you are the ones who represent imprudence and decadence," and physically pushed the reporter away with his hand.
Not knowing that the microphones could hear them, in one press conference during the Geneava talks, Mekdad whispered to Mohamed al-Mohamed, a Syrian diplomat for the Syrian embassy in Geneva, saying "We are giving a bad image, we are not giving the other side a chance". Mekdad"s father was kidnapped by gunmen on 18 May 2013 in his village of Ghasm.