The Syrian peace talks will continue this Monday, February 13 in Kazakhstan’s capital city, Astana. The UN will be present, as will officials from Russia, Turkey, Jordan and Iran. Those present will debate the conditions surrounding a potential ceasefire between the Syrian regime and rebel groups including the FSA (Free Syrian Army) and the dominantly Kurdish SDF (Syrian Democratic Forces). Conditions of peace depend mostly on agreements over humanitarian aid and building mutual trust during the process. The first Astana talks in January were also the first time representatives of the government and rebel groups had met in a formal setting. Rebels and the Syrian government have been fighting each other and Islamist groups since March, 2011.
January Astana Syrian peace talks.
The Global Coalition Against Daesh are allied with the latter rebel groups, whose interests in these talks are endorsed by Coalition members’ UN ambassadors. Turkey currently supports specific FSA factions allied to its Euphrates Shield campaign against Daesh and the SDF (made up of Kurdish groups and other FSA groups backed by the US). Jordan, a non-NATO ally and Coalition member, also aids Syrian rebels in areas military and logistic, backed generously by the US.
Russia and Iran as well as their respective UN representatives, will support the Syrian regime to whom they provide heavy military assistance. Syria’s UN Ambassador Bashar Ja’afari serves to be a direct conduit of Assad’s interests in the conflict. The revitalized fight against al-Qaeda-linked/inspired groups such as al-Nusra is one of Russia’s top priorities in their war on terror in Syria. In no way do Russia, Iran or Syria support the rebel groups in their objectives, especially considering their belief that the FSA fully sympathizes with groups like al-Nusra. Even so, their proposed objective is peace. Russia and Iran have congratulated each other on the success of last month’s peace talks, however, declarations of success in current circumstances are a gross overstatement.
Left: VP Pence, Right: King Abdullah II of Jordan. The King has since been invited back to Washington to discuss further cooperation in Syria and Iraq against Daesh.
The US Republican Administration has chosen not to attend the talks, perhaps failing to see how beneficial it would be to support our allies who aid the Coalition in our fight against Daesh/ISIS. Right now, the US Administration’s efforts are being put into discussions with King Abdullah of Jordan on the placement of ‘safe zones’ for refugees over certain parts of Syria. Where and how the locations for ‘safe zones’ will be acquired is unknown. Rudaw reported that in response to this strategy for refugee management, the UN High Commissioner on Refugees Flippo Grandi said the following:
“Let’s not waste time planning safe zones that will not be set up because they will not be safe for people to go back… Let us concentrate on making peace so that everywhere becomes safe. That should be the investment.”
Countries such as Germany and Canada have chose to continue to keep an open door to refugees, seeing it as more of a benefit rather than a hazard. The US Administration’s commitment to safe zones within a country that is currently a war zone in and of itself is not a commitment, but a shirking of humanitarian responsibilities.
The opposition/rebel delegation at last month’s peace talks. The delegation with not be attending the talks starting Monday.
Rebel groups will not be present at the talks, but they will be represented by proxies within the UN in addition to officials from Jordan and Turkey. These influential proxies can reference the proposals written by the rebels, but the absence of rebel voices and their inability to sufficiently represent themselves will severely limit their options, having to work strictly within their representatives’ limits. The rebels’ absence is likely a result of their status as military organizations with no internationally recognized constituents or political power in the region. Lack of compliance in last month’s talks, also presents diplomatic hurdles for their role in discussing conditions for peace.
Despite the rebels’ lack of legitimacy, such a heavily bolstered platform for the Assad regime is also questionable. On February 6, Amnesty International released a chilling report detailing the accounts of former workers at Saydnaya prison in regime-controlled Syria. The report goes on to say that after being beaten in their cells for days, detainees would be “blindfolded and transferred in delivery trucks or minibuses to [a] white building. There, they are taken to a room in the basement and hanged. This takes place once or twice a week, and on each occasion 20 to 50 people are hanged to death.” It is now suspected that, outside of the military conflict, around 13,000 people have been detained and hanged by the Assad regime’s brutal crackdown on dissent and resistance. Bashar al-Assad has since denied these allegations.
