AFP, Astana :
The UN envoy for Syria said Tuesday that a final declaration was close to being achieved at indirect talks between Syrian rebels and Damascus in the Kazakh capital Astana.
“We are not far from a final declaration,” Staffan de Mistura said. “There are very intense discussions because this is not about a paper, this is about a cessation of hostilities which means Syrian lives.”
Rebel spokesman Yehya al-Aridi said earlier Tuesday that the group would not sign a declaration coming out of the talks, saying it would be issued by its sponsors, rebel backer Turkey, regime ally Russia and possibly Iran.
Aridi added that the final declaration was a “general statement” that is “not meant to be signed by the parties”.
The rebels on Monday backed out of face-to-face negotiations with Damascus over the regime’s continued bombardment and attacks on a flashpoint outside the capital Damascus.
The armed opposition has said that the Astana talks should aim to bolster a frail truce brokered by Moscow and Ankara last month but the regime has called for a political solution to the conflict and for rebels to lay down their arms in exchange for an amnesty.
The first day of the talks yielded no apparent breakthrough.
More than 310,000 people have been killed and more than half of Syria’s population displaced since the conflict erupted in 2011.
Turkey, Russia and Iran have reached agreement on forming a three-party mechanism to monitor ceasefire violations in Syria, Turkey’s state-run Anadolu Agency reported on Tuesday.
It appeared to confirm a previous report by Russian news agency TASS, which on Monday cited an early draft communique as saying the three countries would set up a mechanism for monitoring the ceasefire.
Meanwhile, a jihadist group has launched an assault and seized some positions from Free Syrian Army (FSA) groups in northwestern Syria that are attending peace talks in Kazakhstan, rebel officials said on Tuesday.
Officials from the jihadist group, Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, could not immediately be reached for comment. Fateh al-Sham was previously known as the Nusra Front. It changed its name after cutting its ties with al Qaeda last year.
An official in one of the rebel groups, Jabha Shamiya, told Reuters the attack in rural areas west of Aleppo began overnight, and it was the first time Fateh al-Sham had attacked the FSA groups in that area.
The commander of a second FSA rebel group, Jaish al-Mujahideen, told Reuters Fateh al-Sham aimed to “eliminate the revolution”, saying the group had seized “some positions”, though these were far from its headquarters.
