1. Mouaffaq Nyrabia is a Syrian dissident, politician, political writer and mechanical engineer, best known for his pivotal role in the creation of Damascus Declaration, a prominent Syrian Opposition structure until the Syrian Revolution erupted in March 2011.
In June 2014, the democratic bloc, which became a major force inside the coalition, voted Mouaffaq Nyrabia to be its candidate to preside over the coalition, after Ahmad Jarba, who is a member of the same bloc.
However, in March 2016, Mouaffaq Nyrabia was elected as First Vice President of the coalition.
Mouaffaq Nyrabia moved from Homs, where he did high school, to Damascus in 1969 to study mechanical engineering at Damascus University.
Mouaffaq Nyrabia wrote about the cultural experience of those years, post 6 Day War in 1967, for a Goethe Institute publication, where he considered it a crucial disillusionment: "We were totally convinced that winning the war would be easy for us, due to the propaganda our governments and political leaders had made".
Mouaffaq Nyrabia married Amal Mohammad, a civil engineer and a leftist activist, from Latakia, in 1976, in Damascus, and they had their first child Orwa Nyrabia in 1977.
Mouaffaq Nyrabia was detained in September 1980, by the Military Intelligence apparatus of Hafez al-Assad's government, and was released from prison in November 1985, without charges.
Mouaffaq Nyrabia's second child, Layla, was born in 1988 in Homs.
Mouaffaq Nyrabia lived with his family in Homs until 2007, when he was pursued by the government again, and moved to Damascus.
Mouaffaq Nyrabia left Syria for the first time to Germany, via Turkey, in February 2013.
Mouaffaq Nyrabia started writing in leading regional newspaper al-Hayat in 1998, and later in Al-Jarida, his op-eds in both were among the most read in the country, providing analysis and views on Syrian political map and possibilities.
Mouaffaq Nyrabia's writings were thought to have leftist traits in philosophy they were generally seen as promoting democracy and human rights more than any particular ideology.
Mouaffaq Nyrabia was the president of the preparatory committee for the convention.
Mouaffaq Nyrabia was later on a member of the Central Committee of the Damascus Declaration, until he resigned his position in early 2013 in protest to the committee's objection to the establishing of the wider and more representative National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces.
Mouaffaq Nyrabia served as a member of the executive board of the coalition for 9 months in 2014, and was appointed representative to Germany,; and then as representative of the coalition to the EU and the Benelux countries.
In June 2014 Mouaffaq Nyrabia was voted by the Democratic Bloc in the Coalition as their main candidate for presidency of the coalition, However, he lost the election to Hadi Al Bahra, with a vote count of 62 to 41.