“We don’t want to have a deal for the sake of the deal”, said Kerry at a joint press conference.
Advertisement
They said teams on both sides would try to finalise details in coming days.
“We still need to finalise minor issues, that is why our experts will continue in Geneva next week”, he said. Numerous efforts in the past to pause the fighting and start a political transition have failed, stymied by Assad’s refusal to leave power, Russian and Iranian support for his regime, and the mingling of moderate and extremist rebel groups fighting him.
The U.S. and Russian Federation stressed that Friday’s talks were not meant to address the political issue, but to ease regular Syrians’ suffering and bring a halt to the fighting and create room for broader negotiations later on. Kerry asserted that they had held a new round of negotiations on technical issues for the ceasefire to become a reality, to improve the level of humanitarian aid supply and the sides in Syria find a way to put an end to the war.
Russian Federation and the United States are the co-chairs of ISSG, which comprises the UN, the Arab League, the European Union and 16 other countries.
The talks have been complicated in part by a significant offensive in the southern part of the divided city of Aleppo led by some US -backed opposition groups that are intermingled with the group formerly known as al-Nusra, an al-Qaeda affiliate in Syria that is also involved in the fight against President Bashar al-Assad.
US refusal to become a direct participant in the civil war, even as it escalates its air attacks against the Islamic State and says it will target the Front, has become increasingly hard to implement on the ground as the once-separate battlefields have edged closer together and multiple forces are fighting with different agendas.
Kerry first made the truce and coordination proposal during a visit to Moscow last month.
Russian Federation last week gave its blessing to a long-demanded 48-hour pause in fighting in the northern city to allow in aid, but de Mistura on Thursday accused other unspecified parties of still dragging their feet. Asked what the main impediment was to a nationwide ceasefire, Lavrov quipped: “I don’t want to spoil the atmosphere for the negotiations”.
“In fact, today our American partners for the first time gave us a list of rebel organizations who joined the cessation of hostilities after the United States mediation”, Lavrov further said.
Successive rounds of worldwide negotiations have failed to end a conflict that has killed more than 290,000 people and forced millions from their homes in more than five years.
Advertisement
Meanwhile, in a blow to opposition forces, rebels and civilians in the besieged Damascus suburb of Daraya were evacuated on August 26 after agreeing to surrender the town after four years of grueling bombardment and a crippling siege that left the sprawling area in ruins.
