{"id":34358,"date":"2017-05-04T16:27:32","date_gmt":"2017-05-04T16:27:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/regional-powers-agree-on-syria-de-escalation\/"},"modified":"2017-05-04T16:27:22","modified_gmt":"2017-05-04T16:27:22","slug":"regional-powers-agree-on-syria-de-escalation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/regional-powers-agree-on-syria-de-escalation\/","title":{"rendered":"Regional powers agree on Syria ‘de-escalation zones’"},"content":{"rendered":"

{Russia, Turkey and Iran to create de-escalation areas in Syria, as opposition vents anger over Iranian involvement.}<\/p>\n

Russia, Iran and Turkey have signed a deal calling for the setup of so-called de-escalation zones in war-torn Syria during talks in Kazakhstan’s capital, Astana.<\/p>\n

The signing ceremony on Thursday was briefly interrrupted as some members of the Syrian armed opposition’s delegation stormed out in protest against Iran’s participation in the deal.<\/p>\n

“We saw several members of the opposition delegation stand up furiously condemning what was going on,” Al Jazeera’s Jamal Elshayyal, reporting from Astana, said.<\/p>\n

“They shouted that Iran should not be a signatory to this. In fact, they went as far to saying that Iran is a criminal entity that shouldn’t be here and they stormed out.”<\/p>\n

Elshayyal said that neither the Syrian government, nor the opposition – which on Wednesday suspended its participation in the talks protesting against ongoing air raids – had signed the agreement.<\/p>\n

“It is very clear that this is regional powers who have decided that they are going to bulldoze their way forward, and decide what’s best for Syria,” he said.<\/p>\n

Elshayyal said the deal, which is likely to come into effect in around a month, would allow for “unhindered humanitarian access” to the de-escalation areas.<\/p>\n

Yet, there was no detail on whether the zones involved restricted use of heavy weaponry or complete de-militirisation; or whether there will be a peacekeeping force and how the deal will be policed.<\/p>\n

Elshayyal said the locations of the “de-escalation zones” are likely to be: Idlib, and the Turkmen mountains, parts of Homs governorate, and areas on the outskirts of Damascus – including Ghouta – and in Deraa in the south.<\/p>\n

“Over the past two days, the participants in the Astana talks reviewed the implementation of the ceasefire agreement and the cessation of hostilities,” Kairat Abdrakhmanov, Kazakhstan’s foreign minister, said of a frail truce brokered by Moscow and Ankara in December.<\/p>\n

“As a result the guarantor countries agreed to sign a memorandum on the creation of de-escalation zones in Syria.”<\/p>\n

The head of the Russian delegation in Astana said that Syrian government fighter jets are not expected to fly over the “de-escalation” zones for six months.<\/p>\n

Syria’s civil war, currently in its seventh year, has killed hundreds of thousands of people and has drawn in world powers on all sides.<\/p>\n

The latest round of talks in Astana is sponsored by opposition supporter Turkey and Syrian government backers Russia and Iran.<\/p>\n

These negotiations are viewed as complementary to broader United Nations-brokered talks in Geneva on a political settlement, but neither have yielded real progress so far.<\/p>\n

Abdrakhmanov said that next round of talks in Astana would be held in mid-July.<\/p>\n

\"Some<\/figure>\n

Source:Al Jazeera<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

{Russia, Turkey and Iran to create de-escalation areas in Syria, as opposition vents anger over Iranian involvement.} Russia, Iran and Turkey have signed a deal calling for the setup of so-called de-escalation zones in war-torn Syria during talks in Kazakhstan’s capital, Astana. The signing ceremony on Thursday was briefly interrrupted as some members of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[101],"byline":[160],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-34358","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-internationl","byline-theophile-niyitegeka"],"bylines":[{"id":160,"name":"Th\u00e9ophile Niyitegeka","slug":"theophile-niyitegeka","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":3}],"contributors":[{"id":160,"name":"Th\u00e9ophile Niyitegeka","slug":"theophile-niyitegeka","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":3}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34358","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34358"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34358\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34358"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34358"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34358"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=34358"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=34358"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}