The talks, initially set for Friday between the Syrian government and the Saudi-backed High Negotiations Committee, have been put on hiatus while opposition pleads their case. “We will insist that UN Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura invites them”, Qadri Jamil said. He said he planned to take up further talks in a new meeting with government representatives on Tuesday.
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The Swedish-Italian diplomat said he expected the talks to be “complicated and difficult” but that he hoped the negotiations would “achieve something” by February 11. “The progress of the Syrian armed forces could bring more negotiating advantages to the delegation of the Syrian armed forces at the peace talks in Genevea”, said Sarikis Kassargian, another political analyst.
The attack comes as envoys arrive in Geneva for the first Syrian peace talks in two years.
“The Russians say let’s talk, and then they talk and they talk and they talk”. “We do have a principled position in the United Nations that no amnesties should be considered for those suspected of having committed crimes against humanity or war crimes”, UN rights chief Zeid Ra’ad Al-Hussein told reporters in Geneva.
Speaking as the Geneva peace process still in disarray, Kerry promised that a ceasefire would be rapidly implemented if only the two sides could begin to negotiate.
Scheduled meetings come against a backdrop of stalemates as two past initiatives failed to make headway in solving the political crisis pitching Syrian president Bashar al-Assad against anti-government forces, with terrorist factions such as the Islamic State (IS) and Al-Nusra also in the mix.
Russian Federation claims that its bombers are targeting “terrorist” groups like the Islamic State, which are not involved in the peace talks, but rebels and observers say they are killing hundreds of civilians in indiscriminate bombing. Instead, they gathered outside the United Nations offices in Geneva in a sharp winter wind to protest against “a massive acceleration” of Russian and government attacks on areas around Homs and Aleppo.
He said more than 15 government fighters and 20 rebels had been killed in the fighting since Monday.
The UN-mediated intra-Syrian talks on Tuesday struggled to continue in Geneva when the UN representative met again with government delegation in the morning.
A rebel commander told Reuters he was deploying reinforcements including US-made anti-tank missiles to the Aleppo frontline for what he described as a “decisive battle” in northern Syria near the Turkish border. Troops and pro-Assad militiamen, backed by dozens of air strikes, are reported to have gained ground near the village of Bashkoy.
FILE – Residents help an injured man after what activists said were three consecutive airstrikes carried out by the Russian air force, the last which hit an ambulance, in the rebel-controlled area of Maaret al-Numan town in Idlib province, Syria, Jan. 1, 2016. Under an ambitious roadmap agreed in November in Vienna by all the outside powers embroiled in the war, the “proximity talks”-so not face-to-face-are due to last six months”.
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Mohammed Alloush, a member of the Army of Islam, told reporters in Geneva that “the situation on the ground has not changed and as long as the situation stays like that there is no optimism from our side and no good intention to reach a solution by the regime”.
