Diplomatic Meetings Accelerate ahead of Syria Peace Talks in Astana
TEHRAN (Tasnim) – As a much-awaited round of Syria peace negotiations kicked off in the Kazakh city of Astana on Monday morning, delegations from Iran, Russia, and Turkey held another trilateral meeting just minutes before the peace talks in order to coordinate policies and discuss their plans.
The Iranian, Russian and Turkish diplomatic teams convened the second meeting in 12 hours to review their plans for the two-day peace negotiations and discuss a final communiqué.
Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister for Arab and African Affairs Hossein Jaberi Ansari is leading the Iranian diplomatic delegation in the talks, while the Russian team is led by Russian president's special envoy on Syria, Alexander Lavrentiev.
Prior to the three-party meeting, Jaberi Ansari had a get-together with Syria’s UN envoy Bashar al-Jaafari, who represents the Syrian government in the ongoing Astana negotiations.
Iran has announced earlier it will pursue a four-point plan that it had put forward earlier, entailing preservation of Syria’s territorial integrity.
Hosted by the Kazakh government and overseen by Russia, Iran and Turkey, the talks hope to see the Syrian government and the armed opposition groups find a way out of the crisis that has plagued the Arab country for six years.
Syria has been gripped by civil war since March 2011 with various terrorist groups, including Daesh (ISIL), currently controlling parts of it.
