No sign of breakthrough on first day of Syria talks
ASTANA, Kazakhstan: Peace talks with Syrian rebels and the war-torn country’s government got off to a rocky start Monday, while Washington said President Donald Trump was open to joint operations with Russia against Islamic State jihadists in Syria.
The Syrian rebels’ representatives vowed to keep fighting if peace negotiations with the government of President Bashar al-Assad fail, as the first day of talks in the Kazakh capital Astana ended with no apparent breakthrough.
Monday’s meetings, organised by key players Russia, Turkey and Iran, could have marked the first time armed rebel groups negotiated directly with the Assad regime since the conflict erupted in 2011.
But the rebels backed out of direct talks because of the regime’s continued bombardment and attacks on a flashpoint area near Damascus.
However, they took part in indirect talks with the government and held a three-way meeting with Russia, Turkey and the United Nations, an encounter rebel spokesman Yehya alAridi described as ‘ long and productive’.
“If the negotiations succeed, then we are with the negotiations,” another rebel spokesman Osama Abu Zeid told AFP early on Monday.
“If they don’t succeed, unfortunately we’ll have no choice but to continue fighting.”
Meanwhile the Russian army announced on Monday that it
If the negotiations succeed, then we are with the negotiations. If they don’t succeed, unfortunately we’ll have no choice but to continue fighting.
had carried out joint attacks on Islamic State targets with the United States, a claim swiftly denied by the Pentagon.
The commander of the Russian air force contingent in Syria on Sunday “received from the American side the coordinates of IS targets in al-Bab, in the province of Aleppo,” Russia’s defence ministry said in a statement.
“Two Russian air force planes and two planes of the ( US-led) international coalition carried out air strikes against terrorist sites,” destroying arms and fuel dumps in the “joint operation”, the ministry said.
The US defence department denied the Russian claim but later Trump’s spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters in Washington that the new US president is open to conducting joint operations with Russia to combat the Islamic State group in Syria.
“If there’s a way we can combat ISIS with any country, whether it’s Russia or anyone else, and we have a shared national interest in that, sure, we’ll take it,” Spicer told reporters.
The negotiations in Kazakhstan’s capital come amid a rapprochement between regime ally Russia and rebel backer Turkey, who have come to fill the vacuum left by months of US disengagement from the conflict. — AFP
Osama Abu Zeid, rebel spokesman