FRI 29 - 3 - 2024
 
Date: Nov 10, 2014
Source: The Daily Star
U.N. envoy pushes freeze zone in Damascus talks
DAMASCUS: The U.N. peace envoy for Syria met officials in Damascus Sunday to push his efforts to set up “freeze zones” to suspend fighting in some areas, state news agency SANA reported.
 
Envoy Staffan De Mistura held “constructive” talks with Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem on the plans for “freeze zones” in areas including the battered northern city of Aleppo, SANA said.
 
“The dialogue focused on the results of De Mistura’s trips to several capitals, as well as on his proposal to the U.N. Security Council ... regarding the establishment of a local freeze zone in Aleppo,” it said.
 
It was De Mistura’s second visit to Syria since he was appointed peace envoy in July, replacing Lakhdar Brahimi.
 
On Oct. 30, De Mistura presented an “action plan” for Syria that proposed to “freeze” fighting in local areas to allow for aid deliveries and to lay the groundwork for peace talks.
 
De Mistura presented his plan after visiting Damascus’ ally Russia.
 
Syria has consistently rejected a Turkish-backed plan for buffer or “safe zones” on its territory.
 
De Mistura has been criticized by Syrian media in recent weeks, with the latest dig coming the day before his talks.
 
The daily newspaper Al-Thawra said he took a “hasty” attitude in his briefing before the U.N. Security Council last week.
 
Al-Thawra said De Mistura had deviated from the “limits of the international mission” he was entrusted with. It did not elaborate.
 
Separately, the former head of Syria’s main political opposition said he had visited Russia with other opposition figures and had discussed with Moscow ways to end the conflict, but had insisted that President Bashar Assad must go.
 
Ahmad Moaz Khatib, former head of the coalition of Syrian opposition groups the National Coalition, said Saturday on Twitter that they had met Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and other Russian officials.
 
“At the invitation of Russia, Syrian opposition figures and I visited and talked about a political solution and its mechanisms,” he wrote.
 
“We mentioned to the Russians that our country cannot heal while the head of the regime, who is the No.1 responsible for bloodshed and devastation, remains. We cannot accept his role in the future of Syria,” he wrote in a second tweet.
 
Although he no longer leads the main opposition in exile, Khatib is a respected figure, seen by diplomats as someone who could play a part in a future political solution for Syria, where the conflict is in its fourth year.
 
Attempts to reach Khatib were unsuccessful and the Russian Foreign Ministry was not immediately available for comment.
 
Walid Jumblatt, a leader of Lebanon’s Druze community and head of the Progressive Socialist Party, was also at the meeting, which took place late last week. 

Jumblatt has also called for Assad to step down in order for Syria to reach a solution to the civil war, which has occasionally spilled over into its Lebanon and stirred tensions.
 
Russia and Iran are Assad’s most powerful international allies. 

In August, Lavrov urged Western and Arab governments to overcome their distaste for the Syrian president and to engage with him to fight ISIS jihadists.
 
Khatib, a former imam of the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, stepped down in March 2013 after only four months at the head of the coalition, which is backed by Western and Gulf states.
 
His resignation came after the coalition berated him for offering Assad a negotiated exit, and after the group took steps to form a provisional government that would have diminished his authority.



 
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