DAMASCUS -- President Bashar al-Assad has announced an ambitious new government program to import more cousins from Iran owing to recent shortages in children of his aunts and uncles.

"It's true. Because of the Zionist-CIA-takfiri conspiracy on Syria, we are now running low on cousins," special presidential advisor Bouthaina Shaaban said in a press conference today. "And surface-to-air missiles."

In the last two weeks, three of President Assad's male cousins have been killed in the family's ancestral home of Latakia. Hilal al-Assad, the head of the National Defense Forces, a militia constructed by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, was martyred in clashes with terrorists in the border town of Kasab. Sources close to the Guard have said that Hilal's death was his own fault, caused by his decision to skip an important guerrilla warfare seminar on offensive maneuvers held in Tehran in early February.

"Instead of learning how get the drop on al-Qaeda in an intense one-day exercise that began at 8 a.m., Hilal chose to stay up partying the night before with three very friendly ladies from Shiraz," one high-placed Qods Force military trainer official said. “So he slept in and missed the whole thing. The women were executed as Saudi spies."

Hilal’s raucous lifestyle rendered him ill-equipped for negotiating Israeli-trained jihadists. His body was discovered shot once through the heart, though an early autopsy indicates that he may have been passed out before he was killed.

Two more of the president's cousins -- Ali and Kifah al-Assad -- also died in Latakia in the last week. However, their deaths may not have been caused by fighting the enemy but rather each other. Eyewitnesses say the boys had a heated dispute which turned violent over the remaining balance in a Credit Suisse joint checking account in Dubai. Both were discovered with multiple neck and head stab wounds in a mountain valley.

Qassem Suleimani, the Qods Force commander who has generously helped Syria eradicate imperialism, has indicated in an interview with the Fars news agency that he will use surplus Iranian cash recently made available by relaxed Western sanctions to export more cousins to Damascus. “There goes the new Maserati we were planning to give Bashar. Now Obama’s generosity will send Faisal and Zahran al-Assad to Latakia. Faisal’s IQ is 83.”

“I’ve seen Pakistani centrifuges with more staying power than these Assad boys,” Suleimani said.

Editor’s Note: Please note that this is a satirical piece.