Russia, Turkey and Iran vow to aid truce
Syria talks in Astana end with pledge … but no end in sight
ASTANA, KAZAKHSTAN // Russia, Iran and Turkey yesterday pledged to bolster a fragile truce in Syria, but a lasting political solution to the conflict appeared distant after two days of talks between Damascus and rebels.
At the end of the conference on Syria’s six- year war in Astana, the three countries said they would use their influence to strengthen the shaky truce, which has been in place since December 30.
The three powers also agreed that armed rebel groups should take part in a new round of peace talks set to be hosted by the UN in Geneva next month.
“There is no military solution to the Syrian conflict and it can only be solved through a political process,” said Kazakh foreign minister Kairat Abdrakhmanov, reading a statement from Russia, Iran and Turkey.
After the declaration, Syria’s delegates to the Astana meeting made competing statements that underlined the enormous differences between the two sides.
“We don’t accept any role for Iran in the future of Syria,” said Mohammad Alloush, head of the rebel delegation, who insisted that all Iranian-backed foreign militias fighting alongside the Syrian government withdraw from Syria. Syria’s UN envoy Bashar Ja’afari said it was pitiful that the opposition was criticising one of the three guarantors to the agreement.
Mr Ja’afari said that military operations in an area near the Syrian capital would continue despite a pledge to enforce the ceasefire “as long as there are terrorists depriving seven million people in the capital Damascus from drinking water”.
The two days of meetings in Astana were mainly a Kremlin initiative as Russia has made itself the main powerbroker in Syria, with its military support for president Bashar Al Assad.
The meeting was expected to be the first face-to-face negotiations between the regime and the armed opposition since Syria’s conflict erupted in 2011, but the rebels backed out and mediators were forced to shuttle between the two sides.
The latest diplomatic initiative to end the bloodshed in Syria, which has cost 310,000 lives, came a month after regime forces aided by Russia and Iran retook control of the country’s second city, Aleppo. Meanwhile, extremist group Jabhat Fatah Al Sham launched an assault and seized some ground from rebels from Free Syrian Army groups in north-western Syria, rebel officials said yesterday.