The ceasefire in Syria has been extended by 48 hours after the U.S. and Russian Federation determined that the truce was holding, in spite of sporadic violence. The two diplomats also agreed to extend the current truce by another 48 hours, Toner said.
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But such violations are not uncommon in the early hours of a ceasefire. Still, with no deaths to show for it, stray gunfire here and there is a dramatic improvement over the usual situation in the civil war.
“There was agreement that as a whole, despite sporadic reports of violence, the arrangement is holding, and violence is significantly lower in comparison with previous days and weeks”, Toner told a briefing. If the truce holds for seven days, Russian Federation and the U.S. will discuss setting up a joint command to target groups considered terrorist by both sides, including the Islamic State and the Nusra Front. Several Pentagon officials have expressed opposition to this idea, but it seems to still be at least on the table.
These incidents caused material damage and some injuries, but no deaths, it said on Wednesday.
Russian military officials claim USA -backed rebel groups have violated the cease-fire since it went into effect almost two dozen times on the Castello road, a key route into insurgent-held parts of Aleppo.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based monitoring group, estimates that up to 430,000 people have been killed in the conflict, although an accurate estimate is nearly impossible to obtain.
Separately, Turkey sent a pair of trucks to the Syrian border town of Jarablus to deliver food and children’s toys on the third day of the Muslim Eid al-Adha holiday.
“We have spent much of today pressing the Russians and, through the Russians, pressing the regime.
I would say there have been a number of occasions where we’ve seen what appear to be steps forward and sadly it hasn’t been possible to implement them, but I hope that this will be different this time”.
The UN special envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, said on Tuesday the United Nations was still waiting for Damascus to issue letters authorising aid deliveries.
According to an investigation by Britain’s Guardian newspaper on Monday U.N. -sponsored aid convoys only reach “on average 33 percent of people to whom access was requested”.
The agreement envisions Castello Road as “a demilitarized zone, where there could be greater traffic, greater humanitarian traffic, unimpeded and unthreatened”, the USA official said.
The ceasefire deal was at risk of failing an important test on Thursday, with both government and rebel forces obstructing a road needed to deliver aid to Aleppo, a northern Syrian city where the fighting has concentrated over the past few months.
Robert Ford, a senior fellow with the Middle East Institute who was a United States ambassador to Syria from 2010 to 2014, told Business Insider in an email that the cease-fire would benefit the Syrian government “if it is able to concentrate forces and attack against the former Nusra Front (now Fateh al-Sham), seizing strategic positions from it and setting itself up later to pivot against more moderate elements of the armed opposition”.
“It would be premature to say that we’re going to jump right into it”, Lt. Gen. Jeffrey L. Harrigian, commander of the U.S. Air Forces Central Command, told reporters on a conference call, according to the Times.
But for hundreds of thousands of besieged Syrians, the wait for humanitarian relief may last somewhat longer.
A senior Syrian rebel official in Aleppo said a withdrawal by rebel factions was under debate “because the agreement stipulates that the regime must respect the truce but that did not happen”.
Russian Federation launched its military operation in Syria past year to support ally President Bashar Assad’s forces. But keeping large numbers of US ground forces out of Syria has also created space for Russian Federation to assume a greater role there, both on the battlefield and at the negotiating table.
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But it does not cover militant groups considered terrorists, such as ISIS and Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, formerly known as al Nusra Front. Mistura said the United Nations was waiting for Damascus to issue letters authorising the aid deliveries.
