Russia’s Sochi hosts final day of Syria talks

Rasa - Talks between the Syrian government and the opposition in the Russian resort city of Sochi enter their second and final day in the hope of paving the way for a peaceful settlement of the conflict gripping the Arab state.

News ID: 436150

Date: 30 January 2018 - 16:10

RNA - The Syrian Congress of National Dialog started out on Monday and continued on Tuesday. The talks are moderated by Russia and Iran, on the side of Damascus, and Turkey, which aligns itself with several armed opposition groups.

The discussions are meant to build on the results of many rounds of negotiations between Damascus and the opposition, which were held in the Kazakh capital of Astana last year.

Hossein Jaberi Ansari, the Iranian foreign minister’s senior assistant for special political affairs, is leading Tehran’s delegation in Sochi.

The Astana process came after the guarantor states helped bring a ceasefire to Syria’s second city of Aleppo, and then to entire Syria, which has been witnessing foreign-backed militancy since 2011.

It resulted in the establishment of four deescalation zones across Syria, and was hailed by the United Nations for its contribution to a parallel process, which the world body has been mediating between Damascus and the oppositionists in Geneva.

Opposition tantrums

One group of opposition representatives, which arrived for the Sochi event from Turkey, refused to leave the airport for the venue, protesting the presence there of Syrian flags and emblems.

It threatened to return to Turkey unless the signs were removed.

AFP reported that the opening of the event was delayed by at least two hours due to their intransigence, prompting the Russian and Turkish foreign ministers to speak twice on the phone to try to resolve the issue.

“There have been some problems with an armed opposition group arriving from Turkey, which said its participation depended on additional requirements,” Artem Kozhin of the Russian Foreign Ministry told ITAR-TASS.

Two strands of the opposition have also boycotted the talks, namely the Syrian Negotiation Commission (SNC) and the anti-government Kurds.

The United States, the United Kingdom, and France have withheld their representatives from attending the event, citing “the Syrian government’s refusal to properly engage,” Reuters reported.

After the opening, some oppositionists tried to obstruct Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov’s speech, prompting him to remind them that they will have their own turns to talk.

Commenting on attempts to sabotage the Sochi talks, Randa Kassis, a representative of the opposition platform said, “Unfortunately there are some countries that are against Sochi, against the political solution.”

She added that those who refused to partake in the Sochi talks “don’t really want peace in Syria, they want just to keep the war in Syria.”

A Turkish Foreign Ministry source was, meanwhile, cited by Reuters as saying that “the Syrian opposition” had declined to attend the congress, and that the Turkish delegation would represent the opposition.

The source did not verify whether it was referring to a certain faction or the entire opposition camp.

Moscow, which has invited around 1,600 delegates to the talks, has given assurances that all strata of the Syrian society will be represented.

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