The nineteenth international meeting on Syria in the Astana format opens Tuesday in Astana. During the two working days the negotiators will discuss the most sensitive issues of the Syrian settlement, including the tasks of financing projects for the early restoration of social and economic facilities in the country. It is possible that the meeting will also bring some clarity to the issue of the prospect of moving the meetings of the Syrian Constitutional Committee from Geneva to another venue.
The day before the Astana talks, Kazakhstan held an early presidential election, which resulted in the victory of the current head of state Kassym-Jomart Tokayev. In spite of the vivid internal political events, the republic confirmed its plans for a full agenda of the two-day meeting on Syria, which will end with a plenary session scheduled for November 23 and a press conference of the negotiators.
Astana will host representative delegations from Syria (government and opposition) and guarantor countries (Russia, Iran, Turkey). Observers from Jordan, Iraq, Lebanon, and representatives of the United Nations and the International Committee of the Red Cross will also take part. The Russian delegation will be headed by Russian President's Special Representative for the Syrian settlement Alexander Lavrentiev.
If Kazakhstan's domestic agenda has not complicated the elaboration of the current meeting, the international context can have a noticeable impact on its work and probably set the tone for discussions, said Boris Dolgov, a senior researcher at the Center for Arab and Islamic Studies at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences. "The meeting is taking place in a rather complicated international situation. There is also the Ukrainian crisis and the Turkish army's air operation [on the night of November 20] to suppress a number of Kurdish organizations in northern Iraq and Syria, which Ankara considers terrorist. This context will certainly affect this meeting in the Astana format," the agency's interlocutor stressed.
However, the Russian side has already managed to present its approach to the Turkish operation on the eve of the talks. Thus, Special Representative of the Russian President for the Middle East and African countries and Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Mikhail Bogdanov told TASS that Moscow is for "negotiated solutions" and the search for ways of settlement on the basis of "mutual recognition of the sovereignty and territorial integrity between Syria and Turkey." Other participants in the meeting in Astana will probably not ignore this issue.
Turkey's operation and security issues
As Director General of the Russian Council on Foreign Affairs Andrei Kortunov noted in a conversation with TASS, Turkey's military Operation Claw-Sword in northern Syria risks becoming one of the central topics of the current round of talks. "The challenge is that the format of this operation and its scale would not undermine stability both in northern Syria and in the country as a whole. But there is also an issue of a cross-border humanitarian corridor in Syria, the resolution will have to be prolonged next January, perhaps this issue will be discussed in the Astana format," the analyst stressed.
Experts agree that the cause of Ankara's cross-border operation was the recent terrorist attack in the center of Istanbul, which caused more than 80 casualties. The suspected of the attack has confessed to having links with the PKK (Kurdistan Workers' Party), banned in Turkey, which has an affiliate in Syria under the name of Self-Defense Forces. It is possible that in the near future the Turkish leadership will decide on a ground operation in the Arab republic. Moreover, the terrorist attack in Istanbul gives Ankara a reason to return to its project of a 30-kilometer security zone on Syrian territory along the Turkish border.
Nevertheless, analyst Kortunov expressed his conviction that all three guarantor countries for the current negotiating round "are generally oriented toward maintaining the current situation and seek not to rock the boat." "[All of them, including Turkey, are trying to ensure] as much as possible that the general geopolitical instability in the world does not affect the situation in Syria very much," he said.
Constitutional Committee's work
The fate of the Syrian Constitutional Committee remains another sensitive issue. Currently, meetings of its drafting committee have been suspended, among other things because Geneva has lost its neutral status due to joining the anti-Russian and anti-Syrian sanctions. Among the possible alternatives for holding meetings of the committee, Special Representative of the President Lavrentiev named the capitals of the UAE, Oman and Bahrain - Abu Dhabi, Muscat and Manama.
Special Envoy of the UN Secretary-General for Syria Geir Pedersen, who will also take part in the upcoming meeting, said that despite the suspension of the work of the mechanism, it still has "good prospects." At the same time, Pedersen's visit to Astana actually indicates that "one of the very few working formats for a Syrian settlement right now" is the Astana format, Kortunov noted. "This is, in a sense, recognition of the importance of the Astana format," the expert stressed. - "I don't expect any breakthroughs in the situation, it's too early to talk about it yet, but such participation [by Pedersen] should be welcomed."
Humanitarian situation and aid mechanism
The issues of continuing the work of the cross-border aid mechanism in Syria, whose extension expires on January 10, 2023, also require thorough discussion. Moscow is still convinced of the need to replace it with deliveries across the contact lines. Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said earlier that Russia considers this aid mechanism as a temporary measure and is convinced that it must be eventually phased out and the assistance to Syrians brought in line with the situation on the ground and the norms of international humanitarian law.
Western sanctions also continue to have a serious impact on the humanitarian situation in the country. Thus, Russian President Vladimir Putin, following the results of the Astana "troika" summit, held in Tehran on July 19 for the first time in three years, said that Western sanctions against Syria lead to deplorable results for the people of the republic and called not to politicize the humanitarian aid to this country.
Refugees and terrorism
The situation regarding Syrian refugees also remains difficult. In particular, the Russian Defense Ministry drew attention to the difficult humanitarian situation in the Rukban refugee camp, located in the US-occupied Al-Tanf zone. More than two thousand Syrian refugees are being held in the camp as human shields by militants of the US-controlled illegal armed group Maghaweir al-Thowra. The US-led international anti-terrorist coalition did not allow a Russian expert group into the camp to assess the humanitarian situation.
The humanitarian aspect of Syria's post-conflict reconstruction is complicated by the ongoing problem of terrorism. The Syrian authorities continue to fight with terrorist formations in Idlib and in the south, in Daraa province. Since late October, special units of Government forces have been conducting a counter-terrorism operation in the Tariq al-Sad neighbourhood in the administrative center of the southern province. Eradicating the terrorist threat remains one of Damascus' priorities, and the problem is expected to be thoroughly discussed at the meeting in Astana. "This meeting will not be so drastic, solving all problems, but it is one of those meetings that really should be held to discuss the main issues," summarized Dolgov.
GSV "Russia - Islamic world"
Photo: anjči/Creative Commons 2.0
Based on materials from TASS