Iran, Russia, Turkey to hold virtual meeting on Syria
Iranian President Hassan Rouhani will be hosting a virtual meeting on Wednesday with Russian and Turkish presidents to discuss the latest situation in Syria.
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In a post on his Twitter account on Tuesday, the Iranian Presidential Office’s Deputy Chief for Communications and Information Alireza Moezi said the extraordinary meeting among Presidents Rouhani of Iran, Vladimir Putin of Russia, and Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey would be held on Wednesday.
He added that the participants would “discuss regional and international developments pertaining to Syria.”
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov also said the video conference would see Putin, Rouhani, and Erdogan make “three [public] statements” before discussing Syria in private.
Peskov said the call would take place around 1100 GMT.
The talks among the three guarantor states for Syrian peace would be the first of its kind since September, and would come as the conflict in the Arab country has entered its 10th year.
Earlier, on June 15, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif had said that the presidential meeting would be held to facilitate peace in Syria within the framework of the Astana peace process.
Iran, Russia, and Turkey have been leading a peace process for Syria known as the Astana process, because Kazakhstan’s capital, Nur-Sultan, formerly called Astana, originally hosted its meetings.
On the auspices of the three countries, the Syrian government and opposition reached a first deal in 2017 and a second one in 2019.
While the two deals have helped significantly reduce fighting in Syria, the conflict has not entirely ended, due in large part to Turkish failure to separate terrorists from what it calls “moderate” opposition groups in Idlib and Ankara’s dispatch of thousands of troops and heavy military hardware into the Syrian province to back the militants.
