Alwaght- The outgoing US Secretary of State has considerably intensified efforts to strike a deal with Russia on Syria before Donald Trump assumes the US presidency in January, the Kremlin has confirmed.
A report by Washington Post, Inside Kerry’s race to stop the siege of Aleppo, said on Sunday that Kerry is making a last-ditch effort to stop the Syrian operation in eastern Aleppo, because the Trump administration may seal a deal with Putin's government that “That abandons the Syrian opposition and places the United States squarely on the side of dictator [Syrian President] Bashar al-Assad.”
The US president-elect Donald Trump has signaled a change of direction in Washington’s policy on Syria during his presidential campaign.
During a March interview, Trump said that the US’s "approach of fighting Assad and ISIS simultaneously was madness, and idiocy.” "You can't be fighting two people that are fighting each other, and fighting them together. You have to pick one or the other," he added.
According to RT, Russian presidential aide Yury Ushakov confirmed that Kerry has intensified contacts with his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, to discuss the situation in Syria as of late.
“This [effort] could be called unbelievable, in terms that there have never been so many phone calls between the Secretary of State and Russia’s FM which were focused on discussing a single issue – Syria,” he told journalists. Ushakov refrained from commenting on whether there was had been any progress.
According to the Washington Post piece, which cites four unnamed US officials with the knowledge of the situation, Kerry hopes to secure a localized ceasefire in Aleppo by offering to separate members of the so-called moderate opposition from terrorist groups like Jabhat Fatah al-Sham (formerly Al-Nusra Front). The report says that Kerry has brought in other nations, including Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and, at times, Iran, in a bid to seal the deal.
According to American daily, "There have been several meetings between U.S. and Russian diplomats in Geneva to discuss the deal, and Kerry has been conducting bilateral discussions with all the players. He speaks to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov about twice a week and met with him this month in Lima, Peru. Kerry met with allies to discuss the plan this month in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates".
“Officials acknowledge that a frustrated Kerry still has not been given authority by the White House to bring any meaningful pressure to bear against Assad or Russia, placing him in a weak negotiating position. The prospect of Hillary Clinton being elected president gave Kerry some leverage, because she was expected to pursue a more hawkish Syria policy,” Post adds.
A ceasefire in Aleppo on Kerry’s terms may be hard to sell, as Russia insists that the US’ failure to separate moderates from the terrorists, which was a key point in the truce agreement negotiated by Moscow and Washington in September, was the reason that the ceasefire collapsed in the first place.
Aleppo has been divided since 2012 between government forces in the west and the militants in the east. Backed by Russian air cover, the Syrian army launched operations to purge the militants from the city in September.
The Syrian government’s operation to retake eastern Aleppo from armed groups also appears to be progressing, with the latest reports saying that the militants have lost a third of their territory to the advancing army. Stopping the siege now could give those fighters time to regroup, rearm, and mount a counteroffensive.
Moscow appears to be reluctant to strike any significant deal with the outgoing administration and is waiting for the Trump administration to take power.
“We will patiently wait for that team to take their seats and then we are interested in having intensive dialogue with them,” Ushakov said.
