Azernews.Az

By Kamila Aliyeva

The two-day talks in Astana on the Syrian conflict ended with agreement of Russia, Turkey and Iran to jointly monitor the fragile cease-fire between the Syrian regime and rebels.

The mechanism will observe and ensure full compliance with the ceasefire, prevent any provocations and determine all modalities of the ceasefire.

The government and the opposition both said they supported the plan. Each side has accused the other of routinely violating the truce, which was announced in December 2015.

Many assessed the tripartite agreement as a step toward a political solution to end the six-year war.

“When we came here to Astana, our immediate priority was to ensure the consolidation of the cease-fire,” United Nations Syria envoy Staffan de Mistura said at a news conference. He has said in the past that previous cease-fires broke down because of a lack of monitoring and agreement on how to implement them.

The head of the Russian delegation, the president's special envoy on Syria, Alexander Lavrentiev said the task force will start activity starting next month, RIA Novosti reported.

“The tasks of this group will be focused just on the issues of compliance with the cease of hostilities and preventing any violations of it,” he added.

In the joint statement,the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Russian Federation and the Republic of Turkey also reaffirmed their commitment to the sovereignty, independence, unity and territorial integrity of the Syrian Arab Republic as a multi-ethnic, multi-religious, non-sectarian and democratic State, as confirmed by the UN Security Council.

They noted that there is no military solution to the Syrian conflict and that it can only be solved through a political process.

Although the key topic of the talks was the ceasefire agreement, political issues also were not ignored, in particular the creation of the new constitution.

Russia drummed up political support for the talks in Astana, which appeared aimed at leveraging its rejuvenated ties with Turkey to give Moscow a greater voice in efforts to broker a settlement.

The U.S. has been a key backer of Syria’s opposition under former President Barack Obama. But President Donald Trump decided to largely sit out the talks and not to send a delegation from Washington, and the U.S. was represented only by its ambassador to Kazakhstan.

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