The two countries “re-emphasized” terms with field commanders on all sides, especially in Aleppo, the Eastern Ghouta suburb of Damascus and the northwestern Latakia province, where “we are determined to improve and sustain” the cessation of hostilities, they said in a joint statement on Monday.
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A recent surge in bloodshed in Aleppo, Syria’s largest city before the war, wrecked the 10-week-old, partial truce sponsored by Washington and Moscow that had allowed UN-brokered peace talks to convene in Geneva. The deal excluded Islamic State and al Qaeda’s Syrian branch, the Nusra Front.
The truce held in Aleppo on Thursday and Friday after violence in the city last month severely threatened a nationwide ceasefire between President Bashar al-Assad’s forces and most rebel groups.
Russia, Assad’s close ally, said it would work with the Syrian government to minimize flights over civilian areas where opposition groups and rights activists have claimed that Syria’s military has violated the cease-fire.
A truce in Aleppo in northern Syria between government forces and rebels that was due to expire late on Monday has been extended by 48 hours, Syria’s army command said.
“These are words on a piece of paper”.
Russia’s foreign ministry on Tuesday said worldwide powers will meet to discuss the Syria crisis in Vienna on May 17, with recent fighting threatening to derail fledgling peace efforts.
Yet in a reminder of the ongoing violence, there were reports of multiple air raids on a rebel-held area and shelling of government-controlled parts of Aleppo on Monday, two opposition monitoring groups said.
The August deadline that the USA has set for starting a political transition was a target, not a drop-dead endpoint for negotiations, Kerry said.
The Observatory said a woman and a child were among the three civilians killed when the rebels rained rockets down on several districts of western Aleppo city. “The air strikes were incredible”, said the resident of the rebel-held Kalasseh neighbourhood.
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To this end Russian Federation “will work with the Syrian authorities to minimise aviation operations over areas that are predominantly inhabited by civilians or parties” to the ceasefire, the statement said. With the help of the International Committee of the Red Cross and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent, such assistance has reached over 255,000 people in besieged areas and more than 470,000 people in hard-to-reach areas, the statement said, adding that “many Syrians with urgent needs have yet to be reached”.
