Italy plans to again send an ambassador to Damascus after more than a decade, despite the brutal ongoing civil war in Syria, Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said on Friday. Tajani, testifying to a parliamentary committee in Rome, justified the decision by saying that the European Union “must not leave Moscow with a monopoly” in Syria. Russia is considered a major supporter of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. In recent years, Italy, like other EU countries, has handled diplomatic affairs with Syria from its embassy in Lebanon. But the Italian embassy in Damascus was never formally clos…