International push for pause to war in Syria hits obstacles
Russia to keep up airstrikes; civilian aid awaits clearance
BEIRUT — A diplomatic push for a pause in Syria’s civil war and the delivery of humanitarian aid faced hurdles Friday.
Russia, which is co-leading the international agreement with the U.S., said it would continue its airstrikes, and Syrian government planes dropped leaflets urging rebels to surrender because “the belt is narrowing around you.”
A plan for the “cessation in violence” announced by the U.S. and Russia does not go into effect for a week, and while the Syrian opposition expressed “cautious optimism,” it also said more innocent civilians would be killed in that span.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry praised the agreement in Munich as a significant accomplishment in the five-year war, but he noted that a cessation of hostilities, if achieved, would only be a “pause” in the fighting and that more work would be needed to turn it into a fullfledged cease-fire.
Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said a task force must try to deal with the “modalities” of the temporary truce. The task force includes members of the military along with representatives from countries that are supporting various armed groups in Syria. The Syrian government and the opposition would both have to agree to the details.
The task force began its first meeting Friday in Geneva, with its leader, Jan Egeland, saying he hopes it can pave the way for aid to be delivered to besieged areas in Syria “without delay.” He told reporters that he hoped aid could roll in “once we have all the access that we need.”
A statement issued later said sustained delivery of assistance is expected to “begin this week to besieged areas where civilians are in desperate need of assistance. Humanitarian access to these most urgent areas will be a first step toward full, sustained, and unimpeded access throughout the country.”
“Once we get clearance by concerned parties, the U.N. and its humanitarian partners will be able to reach the civilians in need within the
coming days,” the statement quoted U.N. Special Envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura as saying.
Five years of conflict have killed more than 250,000 people, created Europe’s biggest refugee crisis since World War II and allowed the Islamic State seize territory across parts of Syria and neighboring Iraq.
The Munich agreement could pave the way for a new round of peace talks between President Bashar Assad’s government and the opposition, scheduled for Feb. 25 in Geneva. An earlier session broke down last week, due largely to gains by Assad’s military helped by the Russian airstrikes.
AID WORKERS SKEPTICAL
In the city of Aleppo, where roughly 400,000 people are still living in areas outside government control, international aid workers welcomed the news from Munich but also expressed deep skepticism about it. In a telephone news conference conducted by Save the Children, they also expressed concern that the one-week delay in the proposed cessation of hostilities would give all combatants more reason to escalate the fighting immediately.
“Why wait a week?” asked Dalia al-Awqati, director of North Syria programs for Mercy Corps, who participated in the news conference. “What we’re seeing is shameful and morally unacceptable. It must end.”
Among the Syrians huddled at the border gate with Turkey, the agreement brought little solace.
“The deals they make there are so isolated and detached from this reality here,” said Faisal, 25, who gave only a first name to protect relatives.
Mohammad Saeed, 27, pointed out that before Munich, there were three rounds of fruitless peace talks in Geneva, the last falling apart before it even began.
“Geneva 1,2, 3, 4, 5,” he said, counting on his fingers. “And there is nothing.”
Several spokesmen for the rebel groups that the United States deems moderate enough to support dismissed the cease-fire plan as naive. They said it included a gigantic loophole — it allows airstrikes to continue against Islamic State extremist group and al-Qaida-linked Nusra Front Nusra Front forces — that they expect Russia to exploit to continue pounding areas they control with scores, often hundreds of airstrikes per day.
Both Russia and the United States consider the Islamic State and the Nusra Front to be terrorists. But the insurgent leaders say that Russia has made clear since it began its bombing campaign last fall that, like the Syrian government, it applies the “terrorist” label to virtually all the opposition to Assad.
“Russia will continue bombing Nusra and Daesh,” said Yusef Farrouh, a rebel fighter, using the Arabic name for the Islamic State. “And we know what Russia means by ‘Nusra’ and ‘Daesh’ — us.
“If we thought Russia was bombing Nusra clearly and specifically,” he added, “we would have moved away from them.”
BATTLE FOR ALEPPO
It remained unclear whether the Syrian government itself would welcome a ceasefire. On Thursday, hours before the Munich agreement was announced, Assad told Agence France-Presse that his government planned to retake the entire country in a war that could take “a long time.”
There was no immediate statement Friday on the Munich agreement from Syrian officials. Syria’s state-run news agency, SANA, simply posted statements from Kerry and Lavrov, saying that the fight against terrorists would continue.
Government forces, aided by a withering Russian bombing campaign, are trying to encircle rebels in Syria’s largest city of Aleppo and cut off their supply route to Turkey.
Syrian forces recaptured several strategic hills north of Aleppo and are in position to target the final supply line to the rebel-held eastern suburbs, according to Al-Manar TV, a Lebanese channel run by the militant group and Syrian ally Hezbollah.
Heavy fighting between government and opposition forces occurred south of Aleppo, around the town of Tamoura, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. It said 12 fighters of the Nusra Front were killed.
In the Syrian capital of Damascus, a member of Assad’s ruling Baath Party said that the army’s operations will continue against the Islamic State extremist group, the Nusra Front and other factions that are close to them.
Parliament member Sharif Shehadeh said “the army aims to regain all Syrian territories and any part of Syria is a target for the army.”
Syrian aircraft dropped leaflets over parts of Aleppo province telling militants to “drop your arms or this will be your fate.” They bore a photo of the nearly naked, bullet-riddled body of a fighter and a Kalashnikov assault rifle by his side.
“The belt is narrowing around you more and more. Go back to where you came from. Surrender or you will face your inevitable fate,” the leaflet read.
Since Feb. 1, Syrian troops and their allies, including Iranian-backed groups, have captured wide areas in the north near Aleppo, the provincial capital and once commercial center. They also advanced in the southern province of Daraa that borders Jordan.
In the fight against the Islamic State, U.S. Defense Secretary Ashton Carter revealed that he has secured renewed pledges of more airstrikes and special operations forces from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
The two countries promised to restart now-stalled air campaigns against the Islamic State, Carter said, and will be sending special operation forces into Syria to assist local fighters on the ground at the tactical level in the effort to recapture Raqqa, the de-facto capital of the Islamic State.
Carter would not specify when the extra troops would arrive, and the Arab allies did specify any numbers.
Carter spoke after meeting Friday at a Brussels hotel with his counterpart from the UAE.
Both Saudi Arabia and the UAE are among the leading Arab backers of rebel forces seeking to topple Assad’s government.
The U.S. war plan for fighting the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq is designed to unseat the extremists in Raqqa and Mosul, which is the group’s main stronghold in northern Iraq.
Carter also noted that both Saudi Arabia and the UAE play “an important role in countering the message” of the Islamic State.
“If you look at the nonmilitary aspects of the campaign and the moral dimension of it, the UAE plays an outsized role … and we talked about them working with Saudis in that regard,” Carter told reporters. “Of course that’s not something the United States can do.”
Carter also told reporters that however the Munich agreement is implemented, the U.S. will continue combating the Islamic State in Syria.
“There is no cease-fire in the war against ISIL,” Carter said, using an acronym for the group. “Let’s be clear about that.”