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World leaders announce Syria ceasefire at talks in Munich
Following talks in Munich, US Secretary of State John Kerry announced last night that international and regional leaders had agreed to a ceasefire within Syria to be implemented “within a week.”
Kerry made the announcement alongside Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and the United Nations (UN) Special Envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, following a meeting of the 17-member International Syria Support Group (ISSG) in Munich. The group includes world powers such as the US and Russia, plus regional actors including Saudi Arabia and Iran. Kerry said that they had agreed a “nationwide cessation of hostilities,” which had also been agreed by the Assad regime and mainstream opposition forces. The Guardian quotes an opposition spokesman who said, “We welcome the efforts our friends … if we see action and implementation we will see you soon in Geneva,” where peace talks between the Assad regime and opposition groups ended acrimoniously last week.
The ceasefire is in part designed to kick-start the Geneva peace talks once more and to help implement a much-needed increase in humanitarian aid. A new report published this week indicated that 11 per cent of Syrians have either been killed or injured since the civil war began.
However, questions remain over the ceasefire plan, which Kerry said “will apply to any and all parties in Syria with the exception of the terrorist organisation Daesh [ISIS] and al-Nusra” and any other UN-designated terror groups. It is unclear whether Russia will continue its air strikes, which Moscow says are exclusively aimed at ISIS but Western critics say have killed many civilians.
Adding further complexity, Saudi Arabia told a meeting of defence ministers at NATO headquarters that it is prepared to send troops to Syria alongside Gulf states. Such a move would likely anger Iran, which provides direct support to the Assad regime and is considered Saudi Arabia’s major regional rival. Meanwhile, Iran marked the anniversary of the 1979 Islamic Revolution yesterday with mass gatherings which included chants of “death to Israel.”