This entry passed through the Full-Text RSS service - if this is your content and you're reading it on someone else's site, please read the FAQ at http://ift.tt/jcXqJW.
Tuesday 26 Jan 2016 - 11:49 Makkah mean time-16-4-1437
de Mistura speaking to the press on Syria peace talks in Geneva (UN Photo)
Geneva (IINA) – Intra-Syrian talks that had been scheduled to begin here on Monday under UN sponsorship will now start on Friday, with the first priority being a broad ceasefire, humanitarian aid, and halting the threat posed by Daesh.
Special UN Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura told a news conference in Geneva that he is under no illusions about the difficulties in ending a war that has killed over 250,000 people, sent over 4 million fleeing the country, displaced 6.5 million internally, and put 13.5 million people inside the country in urgent need of humanitarian aid.
According to UN News Centre, the meetings will start with proximity talks and are expected to last for six months, with Syrian regime and opposition delegations sitting in separate rooms and UN officials shuttling between them. Any ceasefire would not cover ISIL of the Al-Nusra Front.
The talks stem from an agreement reached in Vienna in November by the International Syria Support Group (ISSG), comprising the Arab League, the European Union, the United Nations, and 17 countries including the United States and Russia, as part of an effort to end the five-year-long war with an agreement on new governance, a new constitution and new elections.
Meanwhile, UN Special Envoy for Global Education Gordon Brown has warned that 2.5 million children could be displaced as refugees from Syria by the end of 2016, adding that the only way to ensure they remain in the region is to provide stability through a new plan for double-shift education.
AB/IINA
|
No comments:
Post a Comment