Abdel-Halim Khaddam, who now lives in Paris, told Germany's weekly Der Spiegel magazine on Saturday that al-Assad was facing growing pressure from economic problems at home and the international investigation into the killing of Rafiq al-Hariri, the former Lebanese prime minister.

Khaddam, who accuses al-Assad of ordering al-Hariri's murder, said: "His fall has already begun. I don't think his regime will last out this year."

The former vice-president, for 30 years a confidant of al-Assad's late father, Hafez al-Assad, left the government in June.

Al Jazeera