Europe to host fresh Syria talks

Despite repeated setbacks on the path to peace in war-wracked Syria, world and regional powers will give diplomacy another chance in weekend talks in Europe, organized by the US and Russia, to try to secure a cease-fire that sticks. 
Washington and Moscow, which officially cut off bilateral contact on the issue last week after a truce deal unraveled, on Wednesday announced two days of talks — in Lausanne on Saturday, and in London on Sunday.
The meetings come after Syria was plunged into some of the worst violence it has seen, as government forces backed by Russian airpower push a brutal assault on rebel-held eastern Aleppo.
Fresh airatrikes and artillery fire in Aleppo on Wednesday left at least seven people dead, an international monitor said, a day after Russia was accused of stepping up its raids on the city.
In the Swiss city, US Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov should be joined by their counterparts from Turkey and Gulf countries.
Lavrov named Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar — all backers of Syrian opposition forces — as possible participants. But neither side confirmed an invitation to Iran, a key player in the conflict and an ally of Syrian President Bashar Assad.
Then in London, Kerry will likely meet up with his European counterparts — Britain, France and Germany.
Both meetings will focus on “a multilateral approach to resolving the crisis in Syria, including a sustained cessation of violence and the resumption of humanitarian aid deliveries,” the State Department said Wednesday.
In Moscow, Russian President Vladimir Putin “expressed the hope that the meeting set for October 15 in Lausanne... will be productive and contribute in a concrete way to a resolution” of the conflict, the Kremlin said.
French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel urged Putin to push for a cease-fire, despite the repeated setbacks.
Lavrov, meanwhile, told CNN in an interview Wednesday that he hoped the weekend talks in Switzerland could help “launch a serious dialogue” based on the now-defunct US-Russian pact.
“We would like to have a meeting in this narrow format, to have a businesslike discussion, not another General Assembly-like debate,” Lavrov said.
The United Nations said that Syria envoy Staffan de Mistura had been invited to take part in the talks but it was not clear he would attend.
Hopes were low of a breakthrough to end the five-year conflict that has claimed some 300,000 lives.
The West has accused Russia of potential war crimes over its bombing campaign in Aleppo and some have even called for punitive measures against Moscow.
Russia has responded by bolstering its forces in the war-torn country. Putin on Wednesday warned Western countries against imposing sanctions against Moscow over Syria, stressing that Russia would not let itself be isolated.
“We should not go down the path of pressure and blackmail but search for compromise,” Putin said at an investment forum in Moscow.
“I have said one hundred times that we are ready to search for these compromises. We would very much like that our partners treat us this way.”
Putin earlier this week canceled a long-planned visit to France after Hollande insisted they discuss Syria, and on Wednesday slammed Paris for presenting a UN proposal on Aleppo at the weekend that Russia vetoed.
“They put forward the resolution knowing that it would not pass... in order to incite a veto,” Putin said.
“Why? It was aimed at inflaming the situation and fanning hysteria around Russia.”
The Lausanne talks will mark the first meeting between Kerry and Lavrov since the two countries froze their cease-fire talks on October 3, after the cease-fire they brok
ered quickly crumbled. Washington and Moscow have traded blame for the failure of their talks, but in fact, the negotiations never really stopped, with Kerry and Lavrov speaking by telephone.
Meanwhile, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday blasted US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s “unfortunate” comments that she would consider arming Syrian Kurdish fighters, branding her proposal “politically inept.” He called Clinton a “political novice” over her suggestion.
“It is a very unfortunate statement,” Erdogan said in a televised speech at the presidential palace in Ankara. “To be honest I see it as politically inept.”
During a debate on Sunday with her Republican rival Donald Trump ahead of next month’s presidential election, Clinton suggested that she would consider providing armed support for Syrian Kurdish forces fighting the Daesh group.
“The Kurds have been our best partners in Syria, as well as Iraq. And I know there’s a lot of concern about that in some circles,” she said in the debate.
“But I think they should have the equipment they need so that Kurdish and Arab fighters on the ground are the principal way that we take Raqqa after pushing ISIS out of Iraq,” she added, referring to a future bid to dislodge Daesh from its de facto capital in Syria.
Also on Wednesday, the Kremlin said, in response to a call by the British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson for protests over Syria outside the Russian Embassy in London, that Britain has a duty to guarantee the safety of Russian diplomats on its soil.
“Probably the British foreign minister is aware of the Vienna Convention and that Great Britain is duty-bound to take responsibility for the safety of Russian diplomatic missions on its territory,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

Source: Arab News