ICRC official says aid convoy on way to besieged Syrian town

Before de Mistura announced the temporary pause in negotiations, he had said the Geneva meetings were expected to last six months, with government and opposition delegations sitting in separate rooms and United Nations officials shuttling between them.

“I have concluded frankly that after the first week of preparatory talks there is more work to be done, not only by us but the stakeholders”, Staffan de Mistura told reporters in Geneva.

Yet Syrian opposition figure George Sabra told AP that Riad Hijab — a former Syrian prime minister who now heads the opposition’s High Negotiations Committee, the largest opposition bloc — will arrive in Geneva later Wednesday, after which the opposition will hold meetings on whether to continue or leave the indirect peace talks.

In a statement issued Wednesday from London, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry called on Syrian President Bashar Assad’s government to cease the bombing of rebel forces.

Civilians have been under siege in their own homes for too long, and with all parties at a stalemate prior to the peace talks, it seems there is a long way to go before a peaceful solution can be brought to the table.

But both opposition and government representatives have since said that talks have not in fact begun, and fighting on the ground has raged on without constraint.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitor, said at least 64 regime troops had died during the government advance, which began on Monday.

Smoke rises after airstrikes by pro-Syrian government forces in Anadan city, about 10 kilometers away from the towns of Nubul and Zahraa, Northern Aleppo countryside, Syria February 3, 2016. “I don’t see any reason why the air campaign should be stopped as long the terrorists are not defeated”, Lavrov said Wednesday in Muskat, Oman, the state news agency Tass reported. “Both sides expressed their interest in getting the political process started”.

Asked what the grouping would discuss, Alloush clutched a picture of a young boy who he said had been severely wounded by Russian air strikes in Syria.

The UN has suspended peace talks aimed at ending Syria’s five-year civil war.

Russian Federation has stepped up its military support in recent days, using airstrikes to boost a Syrian government offensive on the city of Aleppo. He said it was “past time for them to meet existing obligations and restore the worldwide community’s confidence in their intentions of supporting a peaceful resolution”.

Rebels in the city are now surrounded from the south, east, and north, with only a single opening in the northwest that leads to the neighbouring opposition-held province of Idlib.

The UN envoy said that prior to the beginning of the talks, he had demanded for an immediate implementation of a humanitarian initiative, including lifting sieges and providing access to humanitarian aid to all places which are unreachable at the moment.

Basma Kodmani, a member of the opposition’s negotiating team, described the offensive as a “horrible development”, saying it sent the message that “there is nothing to negotiate”.