President Bashar al-Assad, who was sworn in for a new term on Wednesday, said Western and Arab states that have supported "terrorism" will pay a "high price" and that he would fight insurgents until security was restored to the whole country.
"Soon we will see that the Arab, regional and Western states that supported terrorism will pay a high price," he told his supporters at the presidential palace.
Assad was sworn in for a new seven-year term on on live TV, after his victory in an election that affirmed his grip on power more than three years into Syria's war.
Dismissed as a sham by Assad's opponents, the vote was held in June in areas of central and northern Syria that remain under state control.
Large areas of Syria have fallen to an insurgency dominated by Islamists, including a powerful al-Qaeda offshoot known as the Islamic State that has also seized swathes of Iraq.
Assad, supported by Russia and Iran, has defied calls by Western states for him to step aside during the conflict that started in 2011 with protests against his rule before descending into a war that has killed at least 170,000 people.
Assad has shored up his control over a strategic corridor of territory stretching north from Damascus, taking back major cities including Homs. Backed by Lebanese Hezbollah fighters, his forces are now squeezing rebels in Aleppo.
But to the east and northeast, large parts of the country are in insurgents' hands. The militant Islamic State has expanded its control in recent weeks, defeating other Islamist factions with new weaponry brought in from Iraq.
The United States, which has repeatedly said he has lost legitimacy, had described the election as meaningless.
http://english.al-akhbar.com/content/assad-be-sworn-seven-year-term