hollywoodtone.blogspot.com First round of Geneva 2 talks end with no breakthrough
hollywoodtone.blogspot.com First round of Geneva 2 talks end with no breakthrough
Geneva - The first round of peace talks designed to end the ongoing civil war in Syria have now ended. There was no breakthrough achieved. Each side blamed the other for the lack of progress.
Lakhdar Brahimi that U.N. Arab League envoy to Syrai said that while there was little progress made in the talks, nevertheless they had raised hopes for a solution to the country's civil war. There were some positive steps he claimed and there was some common ground between the two sides. However, he noted that the two sides were still very far apart. The opposition delegation is set to return to Geneva on February 10. The Syrian delegates told Brahimi that they would need to check with the Syrian government before they could agree to return. The willingness of the opposition to return is somewhat surprising since they were very reluctant to come in the first place and many have dropped out of the Syrian National Coalition because of the decision including the Syrian National Council. Many of the opposition want to negotiate only when they are stronger on the ground whereas at the present time infighting has weakened the opposition and Assad is making gains on the ground in some places. Just before the first session Assad forces managed to secure all the routes to the Aleppo International Airport allowing it to open for the first time in almost a year. The conference seemed doomed from the start as far as reaching an agreement on a transition government. Neither side has changed at all but used the meetings as a grandstand to promote their own agendas. The opposition wants regime change with a transition government without Assad. The Syrian position is that Assad will not go and that the main issue is fighting terrorism. As a result it seems quite unlikely that the main aim of agreeing on a transition government will be achieved. Some observers are already writing a postmortem on the talks as if they have already failed. Samer Abboud writes at Al Jazeera:
The negotiations were set up to fail from the beginning as the regime and opposition negotiators came kicking and screaming at the behest of their foreign patrons, with no substantive grounds or political appetite for serious discussion.This is all close to the truth but only with respect to the declared aim of following through with the idea of forming a transitional government. I doubt that the planners of the meetings had much hope of that happening. However, there are common interests in exchanging prisoners, and in providing humanitarian aid, and even in local ceasefires. While an agreement on providing aid in Homs has yet to come to fruition as this is written the problems are with the local forces on the ground to work out the security and logistical details. Aid finally has been delivered to the Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp. Brahimi issued a statement in which he said:
“It was a very difficult start. But the sides have become used to sitting in the same room. They have presented positions and listened to one another. There have been moments when one side has even acknowledged the concerns and the difficulties and the point of view of the other side. Progress is very slow indeed, but the sides have engaged in an acceptable manner. This is a very modest beginning, but it is a beginning on which we can build.”While this statement puts a positive spin on very modest results it nevertheless contains elements of truth. Brahimi went on to indicate what both sides realized:
“Both sides understand that the conflict in their country has imposed immense and unacceptable suffering on the Syrian people. Both sides recognize the urgent need to bring that violence to an end. We hope they will also redouble their efforts to seek earlier opportunities to reduce, to at least reduce, the level of violence on the ground,”Both sides would like to see the violence end but unfortunately by winning the conflict not by negotiating a solution. But in particular areas where there is a stalemate there may be decisions for local ceasefires as being in their interest. The Kurds and Assad have already informally made such arrangements allowing the Kurds to begin to provide security and develop areas they control. For the most part both sides have common ground in trying to alleviate the humanitarian situation that many areas face. Assad should understand that he may be better off allowing aid than trying to starve besieged areas into submission. He represents himself as fighting terrorism not starving his own subjects into accepting his rule. There is not likely to be a giant leap forward, but every positive step is still a move forward that as Brahimi claims can be used as a basis for further moves:
“I hope that we can start to build more common ground when next we meet, in Geneva. We will now have a short break in the negotiations, to allow the sides to prepare their more detailed positions on the issues raised already, and on all other aspects of the Geneva Communiqué.”The enormity of the humanitarian disaster in Syria leads many people to suggest that something must be done immediately to stop the civil war. However, as can be seen by the actions of both sides at the talks this seems impossible. What can be done may seem hardly a drop in the proverbial bucket when compared to what needs to happen to create peace and stop the slaughter but it may be all that is achievable at this time and it is much better than nothing at all happening. I have appended two videos with the complete press conference that Brahimi gave after the talks ended. He notes ten areas of agreement that future talks can build upon. A lesser diplomat would have given up by now.
hollywoodtone.blogspot.com First round of Geneva 2 talks end with no breakthrough