U.N. Security Council votes to lift sanctions on Syrian president

"(The Council) decides that Ahmed al-Sharaa...and (Interior Minister) Anas Hasan Khattab are delisted from the ISIL and al-Qaida Sanctions List," said the resolution, approved by 14 council members. The formal lifting of sanctions on Sharaa is largely symbolic as they were waived every time he needed to travel outside of Syria in his role as the country's leader. Though it will be Sharaa's first visit to Washington, it will be his second to the United States after a landmark U.N. trip in September, where the ex-jihadist became the first Syrian president in decades to address the U.N. General Assembly in New York.