This article is from the source 'nytimes' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.

You can find the current article at its original source at http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/29/world/europe/russia-urges-assad-to-negotiate-with-his-opponents.html

The article has changed 2 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.

Version 0 Version 1
Russia Urges Syrian Leader to Negotiate with His Opponents Russia Calls for Meeting With Syrian Opposition
(about 11 hours later)
MOSCOW — Russia, Syria’s longtime ally, urged the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, on Friday to negotiate with his opponents as further signs emerged that Moscow and other international parties to the conflict were coalescing around the idea of a transitional government as a key to solving the nearly two-year-old Syrian crisis. MOSCOW — Russia has shown a burst of diplomatic energy before talks here on Saturday with the United Nations envoy on Syria, perhaps seeing a chance for a breakthrough that would temper the criticism it has drawn in the West and the Arab world during the course of the nearly two-year-old Syrian conflict.
During a news conference with his Egyptian counterpart in Moscow, the Russian foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, said he had urged a visiting Syrian government delegation “to maximally put into action its declared readiness for dialogue with the opposition.” Mr. Lavrov also said Moscow had requested a meeting with Sheik Ahmad Moaz al-Khatib, the head of the largest exile Syrian opposition coalition. Russia’s foreign minister, Sergey V. Lavrov, on Friday made his first overtures toward the largest exile Syrian opposition coalition, saying that he had requested a meeting with its leader, Sheik Ahmad Moaz al-Khatib. The United States, Britain and several Persian Gulf nations have recognized the coalition as the sole representative of the Syrian people, but Moscow has so far refused.
Sheik Khatib, a former imam of the historic Umayyad mosque in Damascus, said in an interview with Al Jazeera that he was open to the idea of such a meeting but would refuse to travel to Moscow for it. He also said Russia must issue a “clear condemnation of the crimes committed by the Syrian regime.” Though Moscow opposes any international effort to force out Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, in recent days it has expressed increasing support for beginning a political process that would draw in both sides in the conflict. The United Nations and Arab League envoy, Lakhdar Brahimi, recommended this week that a transitional government be established, to rule the country until elections could be held.
Though the United States, Britain and several Persian Gulf nations have recognized the opposition coalition as the sole representative of the Syrian people, Moscow has so far refused. In recent weeks, though, Russia has shown signs that it is distancing itself from Mr. Assad, though it maintains that his fate is a matter for Syrians to decide. “The feeling,” said Fyodor Lukyanov, editor of the journal Russia in Global Affairs, “is that something is happening behind closed doors.” Russian leaders, he said, might see a chance to step in as statesmen after a long and isolating stand against international intervention.
Speaking at the same news conference, the Egyptian foreign minister, Mohamed Kamel Amr, tried to highlight the common ground between the Egyptian and Russian governments, saying they both rejected any foreign intervention in the conflict and favored a political transition. He also said Mr. Assad had to leave Syria, revealing the wide gap in positions between Russia and other nations trying to mediate the crisis, a gap that may yet derail the talks. “No one could understand why Russia was so firm and reluctant on Syria,” Mr. Lukyanov said. “Now it seems there is a chance to prove that this was right — to bring the situation close to a solution, and say that it is a big success of Russia.”
In the Syrian capital, Damascus, on Thursday, Lakhdar Brahimi, the international envoy on Syria, said a transitional government with full executive authority should be established, perhaps within months, and should rule the country until elections could be held. Saturday’s talks will almost certainly focus on removing impediments to talks between the sides — no easy matter, since opposition leaders insist that Mr. Assad must leave power before they will negotiate.
Mr. Brahimi did not say who would serve in such a government, and he offered no details about the role that Mr. Assad would play — if any — during a transitional period. But his comments suggested that if Mr. Assad remained in the country, he would retain none of his authority. Leaders of Syria’s main exile opposition coalition reacted coolly on Friday to Mr. Lavrov’s invitation. Sheik Khatib, the coalition leader, told Al Jazeera that the opposition would not travel to Moscow, but that a meeting could be held in an Arab country.
“All the powers of government should be with this government,” Mr. Brahimi said of the proposed transitional authority. Sheik Khatib, a former imam of the historic Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, also asked for Mr. Lavrov to apologize for Russia’s support for the government during the conflict.
His comments were his most detailed since he traveled on Sunday to Syria, where he met with Mr. Assad and Syrian opposition members in an effort to revive hopes of a political solution to the crisis. But even as Mr. Brahimi and other international diplomats warned Thursday of the high cost Syrians would pay if his efforts failed, there was no immediate sign of a new diplomatic formula that would be acceptable to the government and its opponents. “Why doesn’t Russia respond and issue a clear condemnation of the barbarity of the regime, and make a clear call for Assad to step down?” he said. “This is a basic condition for any negotiations.”
“The situation is bad and worsening,” Mr. Brahimi said. “The Syrian people are suffering unbearably. We do not speak in a vacuum about theoretical things.” Another coalition member, Walid al-Bunni, struck a more conciliatory note, saying, “We want Russia to be part of the solution.” He suggested that an apology was unnecessary if Moscow cut off its support for Mr. Assad, in particular its weapons shipments to the Syrian military.
Over the past month, Mr. Brahimi, as the special Syria representative from the United Nations and the Arab League, has consulted extensively with the United States and Russia in hopes of fulfilling an accord reached in Geneva this summer calling for dialogue between Syria’s government and the opposition. “That’s when their initiatives will be taken seriously,” he said by telephone from Budapest.
Russia, a leading ally of the Assad government, has long pointed to the Geneva agreement, which calls for the creation of a transitional government and for talks between the antagonists, as the only acceptable basis for resolving the conflict. However, the agreement does not address Mr. Assad’s fate, which is a crucial problem because many in the opposition say he must step down as a precondition for talks. Russia has said any solution should be based on an international agreement reached last summer in Geneva, which calls for a transitional government and peacekeeping force. But the Geneva document does not address the crucial question of Mr. Assad’s fate, which remains a sticking point even as Moscow and other international parties coalesce around the idea of a transitional government.
In Damascus on Thursday, Mr. Brahimi also denied that he had proposed a specific plan, as many opposition members had asserted in recent days. And he said the United States and Russia had not reached any agreement that he was pressing Mr. Assad to accept. “I wish there was a U.S.-Russia proposal for me to sell,” he said. “I did not come here to sell.” After talks with Mr. Lavrov on Friday morning, Egypt’s foreign minister, Mohamed Kamel Amr, highlighted common ground between the two countries, saying they both reject foreign intervention and favor a political transition. Mr. Amr went on to say that Mr. Assad had to leave Syria, revealing the wide gap in positions between Russia and other nations trying to mediate the crisis.
The envoy said the Geneva framework “includes elements that are sufficient for a plan to end the crisis in the next few coming months,” mentioning a peacekeeping force to monitor a cease-fire and the establishment of a transitional government. He said that the transition “should not be allowed to lead to the collapse of the state and its institutions.” Analysts and political observers in Moscow said Mr. Lavrov and Mr. Brahimi may try to address Mr. Assad’s role in a hypothetical transition — how long he would remain in place, for instance, and in what capacity, and what security guarantees would allow him and his associates to leave safely.
Mr. Brahimi’s comments were met with pessimism by members of the largest opposition coalition, who have long said that any arrangement that left Mr. Assad in the country was unacceptable. They have also called for the dismantling of state institutions tied to repression by the government, especially the security and intelligence services. As insurgent groups make gains against the Syrian military, the political opposition has shown even less willingness to compromise. But Russia, having maintained a stand against international intervention for many months, is not likely to call for Mr. Assad’s departure now, Mr. Lukyanov said. He said Russia might apply pressure with a more cautious statement, like a demand for “a new configuration of political leadership.”
“His initiative is very late, and it is very much detached from what’s actually happening on the ground and on the battlefield,” said Ahmad Ramadan, a coalition member who is in Turkey. “We will not discuss any transitional government before Bashar al-Assad steps down.” “Russia will avoid until the end publicly saying ‘Assad must go,’ because that will be seen as intervention,” Mr. Lukyanov said. “But at the same time, when they say, ‘It is not our aim to keep Assad in power,’ I think they are being quite honest.”
In Washington, a State Department spokesman, Patrick Ventrell, on Thursday praised efforts to produce a peaceful transition but ruled out any role for Mr. Assad in the process. Fighting continued in Syria on Friday, even as diplomatic activity intensified. Antigovernment activists reported airstrikes by government warplanes in the Damascus suburbs and near the northern city of Aleppo.
Frederic C. Hof, who served as a special adviser on Syria to the State Department, said in an e-mail that Mr. Brahimi’s efforts amounted to “a long shot.” A strike on the town of Al-Safira killed at least 14 people, including eight children, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an antigovernment group with a network of observers in the country. The Syrian state news agency made no mention of civilian deaths in an airstrike, saying that “the army totally destroyed several terrorists’ hide-outs” in Al-Safira.
“Assad is not yet persuaded that he needs to yield power and get out,” Mr. Hof said. “There is no solution that involves him sticking around, even as a figurehead.”

Ellen Barry reported from Moscow, and Kareem Fahim from Beirut, Lebanon. Hala Droubi contributed reporting from Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and Hwaida Saad from Beirut.

Ellen Barry reported from Moscow, and Kareem Fahim from Beirut, Lebanon.