Global and regional actors, including Iran and Saudi Arabia met in Vienna on Friday for high-level talks to reach a political solution to the civil war in Syria.
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Russian Federation and Iran remain the Syrian president’s main backers, while the USA, its Gulf Arab allies and Turkey say he must step down.
The United States, Saudi Arabia and others have tempered their earlier calls for Assad’s immediate ouster and now say he can remain in office for months as part of a transition if he agrees to resign at the end of the process. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the Local Co-ordination Committees (LCC) said government forces fired more than 11 missiles at a market, killing 57 people, though the LCC said at least 40 died.
“The Syrian people should define the future of their country… including Assad’s fate”, Russia’s FM added.
Friday’s pact refers to the Geneva Communique but does not expressly endorse it, and it outlines a political roadmap leading to a constitution and, ultimately, elections. But it remains silent about the need for an empowered transitional government, and it is unclear whether Assad or members of his inner circle would be eligible to seek election. “It mentions the Geneva Communique but it doesn’t even mention the word transition”. “They have been the most forceful in pushing for a defined time frame; they don’t want to leave Assad room to scuttle any potential agreement”, according to Fahad Nazer, a former political analyst at the Saudi embassy in D.C., and a senior political analyst with JTG Inc. “This will lead to no fundamental change”. And they have to find a way to cooperate to help defeat the Islamic State. And getting Iran and Saudi Arabia – the Middle East’s foremost Shi’ite and Sunni powers, respectively – to sit at the same table already marks progress.
As he arrived in Austria’s capital, Philip Hammond, the Foreign Secretary, played down expectations, describing the conference as an “exploratory discussion”, adding: “We’re gathered here this morning to see if there is any scope for bridging the gap we know exists between the Russian-Iranian position on the one hand, and the position of most of the rest of the countries represented on the other”.
“This is the first time we’ve had all the protagonists around a table together and that is quite a remarkable achievement in itself”, the Foreign Secretary said in Vienna.
But potentially signaling a willingness to compromise, Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Amir Abdollahian was quoted by Iranian media as saying: “Iran does not insist on keeping Assad in power forever”. But Iran nevertheless joined the talks for the first time, in a sign of its growing diplomatic clout months after striking a landmark nuclear deal with world powers. President Barack Obama had previously refused to send American ground troops into the conflict.
It also reported the death of a large number of Iranian officers and soldiers in Syria, despite the fact that the Iranian authorities deny the presence of soldiers on the ground.
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A Syrian rebel group, meanwhile, part of a new US-backed alliance that also includes the Kurdish YPG militia, announced an imminent offensive against ISIL in Raqqa province, the rebel group’s stronghold in Syria.
