State media say the cease-fire began on Wednesday and is to last until midnight Friday.
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The ceasefire coincided with the start of the Eid al-Fitr holiday, which marks the end of Islam’s holy month of Ramadan.
There have been attempts since then to reach short-term cessations of hostilities that are often region-specific, but these have tended to be short lived. “We are trying very hard to grow these current discussions into a longer lasting. enforceable, accountable cessation of hostilities that could change the dynamics on the ground”, Kerry told a news conference in Tbilisi, Georgia.
This is the first time Syrian authorities have declared a blanket truce for the whole country. That agreement, which excluded militant groups such as the Islamic State, sharply reduced violence across the country for weeks.
There was no immediate reaction from Syria’s opposition groups battling President Bashar Assad’s government.
The army said what it described as terrorist groups had tried to attack army positions in the area, and that it thwarted this assault and taken over the southern al-Malah farms, coming to within firing distance of the Castello road.
The Britain-based Observatory, which monitors the Syrian conflict, also said there had been rebel and government shelling in areas around the northern Syrian city of Aleppo, and air strikes had hit towns in the northern Aleppo countryside on Wednesday.
On the first day of Eid al-Fitr, Assad traveled to Syria’s third largest city, Homs.
The pro-government forces have also continued the bombardment of the besieged suburb of Douma, he added.
State TV showed him praying in a Homs neighborhood that has seen several auto bombs over the years.
Yasser al-Tayeb, a spokesman for the group, said pro-government forces were pressing on with their ground offensive on Mayda, in the eastern Ghouta suburbs of Damascus, which they launched on Tuesday. Since almost all of Homs fell under government control earlier this year, the city has been mostly calm.
Activists and state media are reporting continued violence around Syria, despite a day old truce, including a government offensive on a rebel-held supply line in the northern province of Aleppo.
The truce has mostly collapsed and the Syrian army and the Russian military, which backs Assad, have periodically announced a number of temporary local truces in areas of intense fighting, for example in the city of Aleppo or near the capital Damascus.
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A rescue worker in the rebel-held part of Aleppo, Bibars Meshal, said that barrel bombs struck Hraitan, an area north of the city.
