BEIRUT (AP) — The fall of Syrian President Bashar Assad’s government Sunday brought to a dramatic close his nearly 14-year struggle to hold onto power as his country fragmented amid a brutal civil war that became a proxy battlefield for regional and international powers.

Assad’s downfall came as a stark contrast to his first months as Syria’s unlikely president in 2000, when many hoped he would be a young reformer after three decades of his father’s iron grip. Only 34 years old, the Western-educated ophthalmologist was a rather geeky tech-savvy fan of computers with a gentle demeanor.

But when faced with protests against his rule that erupted in March 2011, Assad turned to the brutal tactics of his father in an attempt to crush them. As the uprising hemorrhaged into an outright civil war, he unleashed his military to blast opposition-held cities, with support from allies Iran and Russia.

International rights groups and prosecutors alleged widespread use of torture and extrajudicial executions in Syria’s government-run detention centers.

The Syrian war has killed nearly half a million people and displaced half the country’s pre-war population of 23 million. As the uprising spiraled into a civil war, millions of Syrians fled across the borders into Jordan, Turkey, Iraq and Lebanon and on to Europe.