Negotiations ongoing for partial truce in Syria
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E-mail Xinhua, August 27, 2015
Fresh negotiations are currently taking place for re-establishing a cease-fire in the city of Zabadani, close to the Lebanese borders, and two besieged Shiite towns in northwestern Syria, a mediator familiar with the negotiation process said Wednesday.
Mohammed Abu Qassem, secretary general of Syria's Tadamun (Solidarity) Party, who is a mediator on behalf of fighting groups inside Zabadani, told Xinhua that delegations from Iran and the rebel's Ahrar al-Sham Movement are currently holding the last-hour talks in Turkey on a truce in the city of Zabadani, where the Syrian army backed by Hezbollah is advancing, and the towns of Kafraya and Foa, which are besieged by the rebels in the northwestern province of Idlib.
Abu Qassem was part of the previous mediation efforts that took place earlier this month and succeeded to establish a three-day cease-fire in Zabdani, and the two Shiite towns, but the negotiations were later faltered and the truce collapsed.
The Syrian army backed by the Shiite Lebanese Hezbollah has been on a shattering offensive against Sunni-led militants groups, mainly the Ahrar al-Sham Movement, in the city of Zabadani.
In retaliation to the government troops' offensive on Zabadani, several jihadi groups in Idlib mounted an attack against the Shiite towns of Kafraya and Foa, one of the few remaining government strongholds in Idlib.
The rebels in Idlib said they will continue attacking the Shiite towns until government troops halt their offensive on the Sunni-led insurgency in Zabadani, in a sign of how sectarian the Syrian crisis has become.
Syrian officials and local reports said that Turkey and Iran helped broker the first truce in Zabadani, as the Turks voiced the demands of the Ahrar al-Sham movement and the Iranians obviously covered the side of the Syrian government, in unprecedented mediation that reflected a new approach by regional players.
Abu Qassem said that the negotiations have not stopped since the first cease-fire was halted.
He, however, wasn't "hopeful" about the fresh negotiations, adding that if the current talks in Turkey were faltered, the military would continue sweeping Zabadani and there will be no room for further negotiations.
He added that the Syrian troops backed by Hezbollah have become in control of about 85 percent of Zabadani.
He said Wednesday's talks were triggered in part by the Ahrar al-Sham threat that they will shell Kafraya and Foa with 100 rockets if the situation in Zabadani was not settled.
He added the current talks are about the withdrawal of the remaining rebels from Zabadani, as the Syrian army refused the presence of any armed men inside the city.
"If they agree today, we will see an immediate halt of battles in Zabadani, but if not, we will witness a continuing military operation till the Syrian army fully retakes Zabadani," he said.
Zabadani is important for the Syrian army because it's the last rebel bastion of Nusra and allied militants beside the Lebanese borders.
The four-year-old Syrian conflict has taken a sectarian turn with increasing Sunni jihadists joining the insurgency against President Bashar al-Assad's government, who belongs to the Alawite minority, an offshoot of Shiite Islam.
The Lebanese Shiite Hezbollah joined the battles against the insurgency in Syria to keep radical rebels away from Lebanese border and to protect the Shiite community in Syria, not to mention its main ally: the Syrian administration.
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