Putin: Russia Capabale Of More In Syria

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad speaks with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin (R) during a mee …

“How could this man unite a people that he has in part massacred?” But first serenity must come, ” Gazeta.ru quotes him as saying.

“We will continue to support Syria and only the Syrian people will decide at the end of a political process”, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, Iran’s deputy foreign minister for Arab and African affairs, said.

Hailing the agreement as a “historic moment…to cut off Daesh financing”, Mr Osborne said: “We’ll choke off Daesh trade in oil, end extortion, stop sales of historic artefacts and take the fight to middlemen who trade in currency of evil”.

“He has lost legitimacy in the eyes of the country”.

“The West and Russia’s position are coming closer together”, Alexander Baunov, a political analyst at the Carnegie Moscow Center, told AFP.

Like Russia, Iran has insisted publicly that Assad should only step down if he is voted out in an eventual election. “The absence of Assad is a form of compromise to get the resolution through”.

“This marks a very important step on which we must build”, Ban said of Friday’s resolution.

“Sunni regional powers still fear that this pragmatism perpetuates the status quo and allows Assad to stay too long during a transition period”, he added.

The resolution, which comes at a summit of 17 foreign ministers in NY, rubber-stamps a plan agreed on in Vienna last month that would lead to the establishment of a transitional government in Syria within six months and new elections within 18 months.

The conflict in Syria has killed upwards of 300,000 people and displaced millions more, creating the world’s worst refugee crisis since the second world war.

They suffered a setback Saturday as rebels managed to recapture a hilltop overlooking a strategic highway in Assad’s coastal heartland, Latakia, just days after they were forced to retreat.

Najib Ghadbian, the SNC’s envoy to the United Nations, said opposition groups need “a month or so” to prepare for the political talks that would begin in tandem with a ceasefire. Kerry said that most ISSG members agreed that Assad would have to go, and many said so, notably France.

The resolution calls on the secretary-general to convene representatives of the Syrian government and opposition “to engage in formal negotiations on a political transition process on an urgent basis, with a target of early January 2016 for the initiation of talks”.

Russian Federation has been conducting airstrikes in Syria since September 30.

Sergei Lavrov, the Russian Foreign Minister, said: “I do not think that everyone who is there on the ground should be invited to participate in the talks”.