A joint team of Syria’s political and armed opposition will meet the government next month for talks seeking a political solution to almost five years of conflict, the chairman of a Saudi-hosted opposition conference has revealed.
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One of Syria s most important rebel groups, the Ahrar al-Sham force, said it had walked out of the meeting but sources inside the talks and Western diplomats said it had subsequently signed on to the agreement.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad must step down to start a political transition in the country, Syrian rebel groups have insisted while they express willingness to join UN-sponsored negotiations with the government.
Not all groups present at the talks, however, were content with the terms of the proposed framework.
It includes 11 representatives of rebel fighting groups, according to the list of names proposed for the body seen by Reuters, making armed factions the biggest single grouping.
The largest bloc at the meeting, with around 20 delegates, is the Western-backed opposition group known as the Syrian National Coalition.
SYRIAN President Bashar al-Assad says his government is willing to negotiate as long as terrorist organisations are not a party to the talks.
The Riyadh meeting came amid escalating conflict in Syria and accelerated diplomacy to find a political solution to the war.
Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad has dismissed possible negotiation with the Syrian opposition until rebel groups lay down their arms.
This story has not been edited by Firstpost staff and is generated by auto-feed.
The armed rebel group had earlier said it withdrew because the meeting “had given top key roles to the National Coordination Committee and other figures who are considered supporters of the regime”.
“The participants are ready to negotiate with representatives of the Syrian regime… within a specific timeframe that would be agreed on with the United Nations”, participants said in a statement. “Either he leaves through negotiations and this is the fastest, easiest and best for everybody, or he will leave through fighting because the Syrian people reject that this man stays in power”, he said.
Some groups with links to Daesh (Islamic State in Arabic) were in the meeting, and the terrorists will never be allowed to decide the future of Syria, he was quoted by Iranian Students’ news agency (ISNA) as saying.
Saudi Arabia is a main backer of the rebels along with Turkey and Western countries.
The YPG is participating in a concurrent conference in Syria’s northern province of Hassakeh that is unrelated to the Riyadh gathering and that is led by the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, of which the YPG is a member. “We’re going to be watching the outcomes, obviously, very, very closely”, he said. However, one powerful insurgent faction pulled out of the talks to protest the role given to groups it said are close to the Syrian government.
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Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir visited the participants on Wednesday and is said to have made a second visit just before the final declaration was announced on Thursday.
