VIENNA-World powers on Saturday will seek to slender their variations on Syria once they begin a 2nd spherical of talks on establishing the framework for a political decision of in that country’s extended and dear civil war.
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“And one of the aims of the meeting today (Saturday) in Vienna is exactly to see concretely how we can further increase the global co-ordination in the struggle against Daesh”, Fabius told reporters, referring to the Islamic State jihadist group which has overrun swathes of Syria and Iraq.
She said that a string of attacks on a Paris concert hall, restaurants and a bombing near Stade de France “give another kind of meaning to the meeting”. Islamic State, which controls swathes of Iraq and Syria, claimed responsibility.
In an interview with television channel Euronews on Wednesday, Jordanian King Abdullah II criticised the “Cold War mentality” that has hindered previous negotiations involving Russian Federation and the West. The king said Moscow is a key player in talks to settle a political solution to the Syrian crisis, and that all sides must help each other and “need to be synchronised”.
But for the sake of peace, they will try this weekend to decide which of Syria’s fighting forces are common enemies and which can be included in a transition government with President Bashar Assad, their intractable enemy.
Still differences persist on major issues including what role if any President Bashar Assad should play in a transition from war to peace.
On the eve of Saturday’s larger gathering, Kerry was seeing the foreign ministers of Turkey and Saudi Arabia, as well as the United Nations special envoy for Syria.
“Measure it by whether there was a genuine discussion about things that really do divide us, including the future of Assad, which is what we should be getting on to, as well as these famous lists, the lists of who counts as a terrorist and the list of who counts as an opposition group”, they added. Who from Syria’s government and opposition should do the negotiating?
Kerry departed Thursday for Tunisia, which he’ll visit before traveling to Vienna, the capital of Austria.
But regime allies Russian Federation – which has waged weeks of intense air strikes against Syrian rebels – and Iran are resisting Western and Saudi pressure to force Assad from power.
The talks in Vienna are expected to focus on identifying Syria’s moderate opposition groups, in addition to these which are thought-about terrorist entities.
Mr Lavrov said there was “no justification for terrorist acts, and no justification for us not doing much more to defeat Isis and al Nusra and the like”, adding: “I hope that this meeting as well would allow us to move forward”.
While world leaders seem to be in agreement that the time has come to put an end to the carnage in Syria that has killed more than 250,000 people, there is still no clear roadmap on how to get there.
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It’s unclear what the USA and Saudi Arabia, Iran’s Mideast rival, are getting in return.
