Putin says Russia’s aim in Syria is supporting President al-Assad

“Some of his meetings and scheduled programs will be cancelled and he is returning (to Tehran) on Monday afternoon”, IRNA quoted a senior official from Rouhani’s office as saying.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned that any attempts to overthrow the government in Syria could lead to a failed state like Iraq or Libya.

While national security insiders are framing the speech as a propaganda stunt aimed at steering world attention from Moscow’s bad behavior in Ukraine, the USA intelligence community is scrambling to assess the true motivations behind Mr. Putin’s recent increase in Russian military support for Syrian President Bashar Assad.

Lavrov, when asked about the goal of the cooperation with Iraq, said it was to “coordinate the efforts against ISIL”.

Speaking to reporters on his way to attend the United Nations General Assembly in New York, the Prime Minister said Mr Assad had no “long-term” future but suggested he could remain in place during a transition period.

“There are more than 2,000 militants in Syria from the former Soviet Union”, he added.

Since the beginning of the Syrian civil war, Iran has put its full weight behind Bashar al-Assad’s regime, supporting him politically, financially and militarily.

“It turns out that only 60 of these fighters have been properly trained, and as few as 4 or 5 people actually carry weapons, with the rest of them have deserted with the American weapons to join ISIS,” he said.

But “nobody envisages a future with Assad in Syria“, Erdogan cautioned.

He said the cell would focus on “monitoring the movements of terrorists… and degrading their capacity”.

Defending Russia’s military buildup in Syria and support for Assad, he described the Syrian government army as the only legitimate one in Syria and said the US military support for “illegal structures” ran counter to global law and the United Nations charter.

Mr Cameron said Russian Federation and other powers had to be persuaded that it was “in everyone’s interests” to co-operate in the fight against IS.

“In this case, we are dealing with the request of the Syrian government for the provision of military and technical assistance”.

On Friday, the US TV-Channel Fox News reported the four countries were establishing a “coordination cell” in Baghdad, but Dmitry Peskov, spokesman for Vladimir Putin, denied this.

“This does not mean that the Syrian government does not need reform…”

A statement from Iraq’s Joint Operations Command said the deal with Moscow comes amid “growing concern over the presence of thousands of Russian terrorists engaged in criminal acts with Daesh (IS)”.