BEIRUT: Syrian rebels were on Wednesday facing a deadline in negotiations with Russia to either agree to tough surrender terms in the south or come under a renewed military onslaught.
Moscow has been backing a two-week offensive by Syrian President Bashar al Assad’s forces against rebels in the southern provinces of Daraa and Quneitra.
But it is simultaneously brokering talks with rebel towns for negotiated surrenders in a carrot-and-stick strategy that Russia and the regime have successfully used in the past.
More than 30 towns have already agreed to return to Syrian control and talks were focused on remaining rebel territory in Daraa’s western countryside and the southern half of the city.
Rebels were set to meet with a Russian delegation on Wednesday afternoon to deliver their decision on Moscow’s proposal for a regime takeover of the rest of the south, a spokesman for the opposition’s southern operations said.
Ibrahim Jabbawi said that rebels were “now discussing its content with key figures and fighters in the south on whether to return to the negotiating table.”
“We hope to reach an agreement so that the displaced can return home and the fighting can stop,” Jabbawi said.
A source close to the talks said the meeting would take place at 4:00 pm local time (1300 GMT). It follows a tense hours-long meeting on Tuesday.
In that session, rebels proposed a ceasefire, the army’s withdrawal from towns it had already taken, and safe passage to opposition territory elsewhere for fighters or civilians refusing to live under Syrian control.
But Moscow roundly rejected the terms, the source said, and responded with a counter-proposal.
It told negotiators that population transfers were not on the table in the south, although it had agreed to them in other areas like Eastern Ghouta and Aleppo. Russia insisted the army would return to its pre-2011 positions, and local police would take over towns in coordination with Russian military police.
The Russian delegation warned opposition factions that Wednesday “would be their last day to negotiate, and that they’d have to submit their final answer in the afternoon meeting,” the source said. Moscow has used tough deadlines in the past with rebel negotiators but has extended them at times.
According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based war monitor, air strikes had stopped for several days to allow for negotiations.
“Today will be the last round — either the rebels agree to these terms, or the military operations resume,” the source said.
That blend of military pressure and negotiated surrenders has expanded the regime’s control of Daraa province to around 60 per cent — double what it held when it began operations on June 19.
The violence has displaced between 270,000 and 330,000 people, according to the UN.
— Agencies
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