The meeting ended without a deal on Syria and differences remain, a senior State Department Official said earlier.
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“We don’t believe tactical operations between members of the SDF and Turkish forces, or forces supported by Turkey, to be productive in terms of the fight against Daesh”, US State Department John Kirby said on Tuesday.
The civil war in Syria has killed more than 250,000 people, displaced 11 million and led to a refugee crisis in the Middle East and Europe.
The U.S. and Russian Federation are negotiating an agreement to coordinate military operations in Syria against groups like Daesh and al-Nusra, which has rebranded itself Jabhat Fateh Al-Sham, or the Front for the Conquest of the Levant, after recently breaking from al-Qaeda.
Kerry has said the USA will not accept just any deal only to have it collapse again.
On the table is a tough set of conditions that Moscow would have to get Syria to agree to, and uphold, before any U.S-Russian coordination could take place.
Kerry said at the G20 economic summit in China that the talks have stalled over some “technical” issues but they would resume Monday.
The US may be conducting biological research that is “not entirely peaceful”, as Washington opposes the idea of tightening worldwide control over biological weapons, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said.
The former vice-president of the National Coalition for Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces Hisham Marwa, who participated in the preparatory meetings of the committee on Saturday and Sunday told Asharq Al-Awsat: “There is a US effort to reach a near agreement, however, the problem, as usual, remains with Russia’s failure to respect the practical steps”. Obama says “we have deep commitments” to account for those lost during the war. But officials removed Lavrov’s podium just before Kerry came out – alone – to announce that no agreement had been finalized.
On Sunday, U.S. President Barack Obama said that the two countries were struggling to reach a new ceasefire agreement between Damascus and rebels. The idea is for Russian Federation to use its significant influence over Assad to ensure compliance with the deal.
Russian Federation has backed Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, but the United States has worked with moderate opposition forces fighting Assad.
Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook rejected the claim, telling reporters Wednesday, “we don’t have any information at this point to support Russian claims that they carried out this strike”.
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“Many of the groups considered acceptable by the USA have actually affiliated with Jabhat al-Nusra, while Jabhat al-Nusra is using them to avoid being attacked”, Russia’s top diplomat explained.
