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In a stark reminder of the urgency of the quest – and even as the United States envoy and the Kremlin leader were meeting Tuesday – a monitoring group said suspected Russian air strikes killed 34 Syrian civilians.
“The United States and our partners are not seeking so-called regime change (in Syria)”, Kerry said this week during a visit to Moscow. “We are very grateful for these efforts”, Kerry said. But the emphasis of both the nations is and should be on how to facilitate peace process in the troubled country so that the Syrians could make a valid decision for their future after getting out of the state of disturbance.
Turkey, along with the USA, is at odds with Russian Federation over how to solve Syria’s intractable civil war that has consumed the country, killing a quarter of a million people and sending millions more to neighboring countries as refugees.
There were no hot mikes to capture whatever secret ultimatums or promises were made between Kerry and Putin, like President Obama infamously promising to the Russians in 2012 that “after my election I have more flexibility” on nuclear missile defense. Kerry doubled down on this, however, insisting that the United States and Russian Federation see Syria’s future fundamentally the same way.
Earlier this month, Alexander Grushko, Moscow’s permanent representative to North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, said that the U.S.-led coalition “politically covered” Turkey by not providing any opinion over the aircraft downing and accused it of being equally responsible for the incident.
It was ridiculous for President Obama to call for Assad’s ouster then do virtually nothing to achieve his stated goal.
The US and Russian Federation back opposing sides in the Syrian conflict, but agree Syria must remain a sovereign entity to avoid further destabilization in the region.
“I am pleased to say President Putin took that under advisement”, said Kerry, adding Putin himself had stressed the need for military coordination to avoid possible problems. However, he described the Syrian opposition’s demand that Assad must leave as soon as peace talks begin as a “nonstarting position, obviously”. Beyond Assad, these include which rebel groups in Syria should be allowed to participate in the transition process and which should be deemed terrorists, and – like the Islamic State group and al-Qaida – combatted by all.
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The upcoming meeting would continue to work on the list of “generally recognized” terrorist organizations, as well as the formation of a Syrian opposition delegation, Lavrov said.
