Dubai: Ending the fighting in Aleppo and renewing negotiations on a political settlement in Syria depends on “big magnanimous” gestures from Russia, US Secretary of State John Kerry said after a meeting of foreign ministers in Paris.
European and Arab diplomats also met with Syrian opposition leaders in Paris on Saturday. They called for an immediate ceasefire and prepared for a post-battle plan.
They agreed on the need to guarantee that civilians can get much needed food and medical aid after intense bombing, and to ensure that opposition members aren’t executed or abused, French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said.
But such guarantees hinge on Al Assad’s government and its Russian backers.
The Syrian opposition said they would be willing to resume negotiations with Bashar Al Assad’s regime “without pre-conditions”, Ayrault said after talks.
“We need to tie down the conditions for a genuine political transition, and negotiations must resume on a clear basis within the framework of the UN resolution” he added, referring to a roadmap for ending the five-year-old Syria war.
Repeated talks between Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov this week have failed to halt the violence, although Lavrov said Friday he hoped a truce deal could be reached soon.
Kerry was not upbeat about the chances of success ahead of the meetings in Paris and Geneva on Saturday.
“I know people are tired of these meetings, I’m tired of these meetings,” Kerry said.
“But what am I supposed to do? Go home and have a nice weekend ... while people are dying? Sit there in Washington and do nothing?”
With tens of thousands fleeing and prospects increasingly grim for the Western-backed opposition, Kerry insisted that even if Syrian President Bashar Al Assad’s forces conquer Aleppo, “war will not end,” because its underlying causes remain unresolved.
US and Russian military experts and diplomats are holding closed-door talks in Geneva later Saturday to work out details of the rebels’ exit from eastern Aleppo.
Kerry said he is “hopeful” about the Geneva talks but called it “the hardest kind of diplomacy.” He and Ayrault also urged a return to negotiations between Al Assad and his opponents on Syria’s political future.
“We are determined to reduce the suffering of a people who have been facing a barbaric war for five years,” Ayrault said. He warned that if Russia and Syria don’t agree to guarantees for civilians, “millions of displaced people won’t be able to return” for fears of persecution.
Complicating tensions, some opposition members have “threatened people who were going to leave and in some cases prevented humanitarian assistance,” Kerry said, calling it is “absolutely unacceptable.”
Kerry insisted that the US is carefully vetting the movement of weapons it provided to opposition forces, amid fears they will fall into extremist hands.
