SYRIAN OPPOSITION GETS INVITED TO GENEVA TALKS
Delegation has not demanded Assad’s departure as a precondition
The UN special envoy for Syria will invite the Syrian opposition delegation to Geneva for talks starting this week, he said yesterday, as his deputy held talks with officials in Damascus over this month’s negotiations.
Staffan de Mistura’s announcement came a day after the opposition named its unified delegation, which includes internal and external groups.
The talks in Geneva start on Tuesday.
The Syrian opposition’s 36-member delegation will be led by Nasr Al Hariri, a cardiologist who took part in earlier talks in Geneva over the past year.
Mr De Mistura said that the opposition team had been announced and given the task of negotiating in Geneva without any preconditions.
He said the implementation of UN resolutions is regarded as the sole reference for the talks.
On Friday the opposition concluded a three-day meeting in Saudi Arabia, in which its representatives called for direct and unconditional negotiations with the Syrian government that would lead to the start of a transition.
The opposition did not say that their participation in the talks would be conditional upon the departure of president Bashar Al Assad from office, indicating a degree of flexibility.
“The direct talks are to achieve a specific goal, which is political transition,” Mr Al Hariri said in the Saudi capital on Friday.
The Syrian government delegation has in the past said the fate of Mr Al Assad is not up for negotiation, vowing not to give the opposition through peace talks what they failed to achieve through war.
Meanwhile in Damascus, Mr De Mistura’s deputy, Ramzy Ramzy, held talks with Syria’s deputy foreign minister and chief negotiator, Faisal Mekdad.
Mr Ramzy said the Geneva talks would cover four main topics: a new constitution, governance, elections and battling terrorism, with the focus mostly on the constitution and elections.
There is no information yet about who the government is sending.
“The political process is difficult and complicated because the situation in Syria is complicated, so we are building our strategy one step at a time,” Mr Ramzy said. “I hope that the next round with effective participation of the government and the presence of a united opposition team will help in pushing the matter forward.”
The opposition delegation will comprise members from various groups, including the High Negotiations Committee.
Syria’s disparate opposition has been under heavy pressure to unify their ranks and drop some of their more radical demands after battlefield victories gave Mr Al Assad’s regime the upper hand.
“We expect the other side to come to the negotiations so that we can all move forward in the political process,” Mr Al Hariri said.
Several rounds of talks hosted by the UN have failed to bring an end to the Syrian conflict, which has killed more than 330,000 people since 2011 and forced millions from their homes.
Meanwhile, Iranian president Hassan Rouhani told Mr Al Assad that Iran would stand by Syria in the fight against terrorism and in the reconstruction of the country.