Syrian president Bashar al-Assad was in Saudi Arabia on Friday to attend an Arab League summit as regional leaders edge towards normalising relations more than a decade after isolating Damascus following the regime’s violent crackdown on a popular uprising that triggered a civil war.

In a sign of shifting regional priorities, Arab states have stepped up their re-engagement with Assad in the hope that they can coax him into taking action on issues that have rippled across borders, including the plight of millions of refugees and a multibillion-dollar illicit drugs trade.

As part of the diplomatic push led by Saudi Arabia, Arab states plan to implement a scheme to encourage refugees to go home and convince western powers to ease sanctions on the pariah state.