Free Syrian Army fighters fire a homemade mortar towards the Wadi Al Deif military base where forces loyal to Syria’s President Bashar Al Assad are located, in Idlib, yesterday.
BEIRUT: Russia is ready to host informal talks between Syrian President Bashar Al Assad’s government and the opposition, Itar-Tass quoted Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov as saying yesterday.
The news agency quoted Bogdanov, who represented Russia at talks in Geneva on Tuesday with US officials and UN-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, as saying that the consultations “do not necessarily have to end in some sort of agreement.”
It was most important to “create an atmosphere for (future) talks,” the news agency quoted Bogdanov as saying in Geneva.
Bogdanov added that some opposition groups have already agreed to come to Moscow, although he provided no further details, the news agency report said.
The Russian diplomat explained that the talks could pave the way for the staging of a formal Geneva 2 conference involving the warring parties and world powers as well as regional Arab states.
The Geneva 2 conference has been delayed throughout the year because of disagreements about who might attend and some rebel leaders’ insistence on making Assad’s ouster a precondition for the meeting.
Meanwhile, a bomb explosion rocked the heart of the Syrian capital yesterday, killing at least 16 people and wounding 50 others, state media reported.
The blast came as rebels seized parts of a key arms depot in the central province of Homs and regime forces recaptured most of the Kurdish town of Tal Aran in the northern province of Aleppo, a monitor said.
Also in Aleppo, fighters from the Al Qaeda-affiliated Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) seized a major power plant, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
The blast in central Damascus hit Al Hijaz Square, killing 16 people including two women.
State news agency Sana said it was caused by a bomb placed at the entrance to the Hijaz railroad company and that more than 50 people had been wounded, among them women and children.
In Homs province, the Observatory said rebel forces had taken over parts of an arms depot, though a security official in Damascus denied the insurgents had advanced or seized weapons, saying the fighting was ongoing.
The conflicting reports come just over two weeks after jihadists and other rebels launched a major offensive aimed at capturing one of Syria’s largest weapons depots, near Mahin in the Homs countryside.
The fight for the depot left more than 50 rebel fighters and 20 loyalists dead on Tuesday alone, the Observatory said.
Fighters from Al Nusra Front and ISIL — both linked to Al Qaeda — and the Al Khadraa and Baba Amr Commandos battalions “took over buildings of an army weapons depot near Mahin,” the group said. The rebels “seized a large amount of weapons” in the complex, which comprises some 30 buildings, it added.
The regime security official denied the report, saying: “The battle is continuing. The terrorists did not take any weapons, and there are many losses in their ranks.” The Syrian government refers to all the rebels battling to overthrow President Bashar Al Assad as “terrorists”.
Agencies
