Many in Syria had questioned Russia’s motives for the region after the publication of a draft constitution which appeared to suggest that federalisation might be an option in the future, particularly in Kurdish regions. Syrian Envoy to the UN, Dr. Bashar al- Jaafari patently rejected such proposals.
As a result, Iran, Russia, and Turkey managed to sign a final communique and agreed on the establishment of a trilateral mechanism to support the ceasefire in Syria and monitor possible violations.
Does this meeting in Astana mean the end of the war in Syria? Such a prediction is quite optimistic. However, nowadays, there is no doubt that peace in Syria is possible. Astana became an optimal platform where conditions to hold the first official meeting between the Syrian government and the armed opposition were created.
Şamil Tayyar, a Turkish MP from President Erdogan’s ruling AKP party, agrees with Donald Trump that NATO in its current configuration is obsolete.
But Mr. Tayyar has gone much further than that. In remarks made in the aftermath of the passage of legislation which will confer further strong-man, borderline dictatorial powers upon President Erdogan, Tayyar lambasted NATO, of which Turkey has been a member of since 1952.
Note by The Saker: as has been the case so many times in the past, I am posting an article with which I disagree, rather strongly, in fact, but which
The peace talks on Syria, which are due to be held in the Kazakhstan capital of Astana on January 23, will not be attended by a special US delegation, said the US State Department acting spokesman, Mark Toner in a statement, cited by Reuters.
“Given our presidential inauguration and the immediate demands of the transition, a delegation from Washington will not be attending the Astana conference,” said Toner.
However, according to the State Department, the US will be represented at the meeting by its Ambassador to Kazakhstan George A. Krol.
The Syrian crisis approaches a decisive moment. According to a Syrian political expert Abbas Juma, the liberation of Aleppo, which was officially declared by the Syrian army on December 12, became a starting point for strengthening the Turkey-Russia-Iran cooperation, uniting their efforts to give a new impulse to the settlement of the Syrian crisis.
Leaders of the two main rival Palestinian political groups, Fatah and Hamas have met in Moscow where they agreed to form a unity ‘all-Palestine’ government.
Although many symbolic talks between Fatah and Hamas have resulted in meaningless deadlock, today’s agreement could pave the way for a future peace conference between a united Palestine and Israel.
In this fifteenth edition of the Russian Newspapers Monitor, Professor Filip Kovacevic discusses the articles from four Russian newspapers: RBK, Kommersant, Izvestia, and Komsomolskaya Pravda. He discusses the record gas exports to Europe by the Russian gas giant Gazprom, the Russia-Turkey-Iran relations on the eve of the Syrian conflict resolution negotiations in Astana, the interview of the top Russian diplomat at the UN, Vitaly Churkin, and the Russian reaction to the president-elect Donald Trump’s first press conference.
