A guide to Syria peace

Key players in the Syrian war on Friday thrashed out more details of a Russian-led plan to ease six years of violence at the latest round of talks in Kazakhstan’s capital Astana. Here is a quick look at who was there and what they discussed. asics onitsuka Who’s talking — The talks are co-sponsored Russia and Iran and Turkey, but Moscow has been the key driving force for the meetings since they began in January. The diplomatic push brings together the Syrian government and representatives of the opposition, including some key armed groups who had previously steered clear of other negotiations. While the United Nations has got increasingly involved, the Astana process has seen Moscow, Ankara and Tehran largely sideline the West. While the early rounds of the Astana negotiations failed to make much progress, recent meetings have enjoyed far more success. new balance 446 Russia, Iran and Turkey in May agreed a plan to set up four “de-escalation” zones to halt fighting in flashpoint territories held by moderate rebels. adidas sneakers Since then Moscow has forged on with establishing the zones on the ground and deployed military police to patrol the boundaries of the three zones in the south, in Eastern Ghouta near Damascus and in the central Homs province. At the latest sixth round of talks that ended on Friday, Moscow, Tehran and Ankara agreed that they would jointly police the fourth zone covering the contentious Idlib province on the border of Turkey. asics gel lyte iii Idlib is the only province in Syria that remains entirely beyond government control after having been captured in 2015 by an alliance of IS and rebels. cheap jordans uk Negotiations over who would patrol the zone had dragged on, with Turkey and Iran thought to be jostling to increase their influence. new balance black What impact — According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors daily the death toll and the air strikes across Syria, the impact of the de-escalation zones has been significant. adidas chaussures “Since the implementation of the de-escalation zones agreement in Syria, the death toll has fallen significantly and the air strikes have almost stopped,” in the respective areas, Abdel Rahman, head of the observatory, said. nike air max pas cher Peace in sight — The negotiations in Astana have done more to still the violence that has killed over 330,000 people in the past six years than any previous diplomatic push. While the talks have been focused on fighting on the ground they have not dealt with the major political obstacles blocking the path to any final peace deal in Syria. New Balance 990 Baskets Those issues are still mainly being handled by the United Nations at parallel talks in Geneva, but progress there has been negligible. It remains to be seen if any advances in Astana can eventually be translated into concrete progress on the political front.