Russia and the United States agreed at talks in Moscow on Thursday to use their influence over the sides in the Syria conflict to speed up progress towards a political solution.
Speaking after a four-hour meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, US Secretary of State John Kerry said Moscow and Washington would try in the next few days to nudge Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad to “make the right decision” about committing fully to peace talks.
Negotiations in Geneva between representatives of the Syrian government and opposition are bogged down, and Washington believes that Moscow, closely allied to Assad, can convince Damascus to make concessions.
The main stumbling block is whether Syria’s political transition will lead to Assad leaving office. His opponents and Western governments say he must go, but Damascus says that is not even on the agenda for negotiations.
“Russia will have to speak itself as to what it is going to choose to do in order to help Mr Assad make the right decisions, but we agreed today that we will accelerate the effort to try to move the political process forward,” Kerry told a news conference after his talks with Putin.
“I believe that Russia is fully engaged in this effort and all of us are going to try and get President Assad to make the right decision over these next days to engage in a political process that results in a genuine transition” and brings peace to Syria,” Kerry said.
However, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who appeared alongside Kerry at the news conference in the Kremlin, did not say in his remarks if Russia was prepared to apply any pressure specifically on Assad.
He said only that Russia would encourage all sides to commit to the principles of the talks in Geneva, which are being brokered by the United Nations. “Perhaps the most important thing at this stage: we agreed to increase efforts to establish the necessary conditions for a political process,” Lavrov said.
“The political process should end with the Syrians themselves agreeing on how they want to see their country.” “As for the most immediate tasks, we have agreed to work towards a speedy start of direct talks in Geneva between the government delegation and a whole spectre of the opposition,” Lavrov told reporters.
