New round of peace talks begin
GENEVA — Syrian peace talks under the auspices of the UN resumed in Geneva on Thursday, 10 months after falling apart over escalating bloodshed in the war-torn country.
The talks in the Swiss capital began as Turkish troops and Syrian opposition forces seized the centre of the Islamic State-held town of al-Bab, breaking a weeks-long deadlock at the periphery of the town in northern Syria.
The seizure of al-Bab after a protracted, bloody fight that levelled large parts of the city brings Ankara closer to its stated goal for its months-long operation in Syria: Driving Islamic State fighters from the border and preventing Kurdish rebels in the north from linking their territories west and east of Syria along the Turkish border.
The Geneva talks, which exclude extremist groups such as Islamic State, are the latest bid to end Syria’s catastrophic six-year war that has killed hundreds of thousands of people and displaced some 11 million more. The conflict has long been a proxy war between international and regional stakeholders in the Arab nation.
UN Syria envoy Staffan de Mistura convened separate meetings with representatives of the government and opposition delegations Thursday morning.
De Mistura also met with a group of Syrian women who came to push for the discussion of the fate of detainees and abducted people in the Syrian conflict. They held a symbolic moment of silence together.
“There are thousands and thousands of mothers, wives, daughters who are hoping that at least this aspect will be one of the benefits of any negotiation,” De Mistura said.
Abdulahad A stepho, a member of the opposition delegation, said rebels would feature in a “greater role” in this round of talks, reflecting the changing dynamics inside Syria, where factions are drifting away from the exiled opposition leadership and closer to ultraconservative groups such as Ahrar al Sham and the al-Qaida-linked Fatah al-Sham Front.
The Geneva talks come after ceasefire discussions in Astana, Kazakhstan, that were co-ordinated largely by Turkey, the opposition’s closest state backer in the civil war, and Russia, whose air power has supported Syrian President Bashar Assad’s forces.