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Permanent Mission of the Russian Federation to the European Union

Submitted on 2016-10-31 14:09:17

Comment on the implementation of the Russia-US agreements on Syria


Comment by the Permanent Mission of the Russian Federation to the United Nations Office and other International Organizations in Geneva on the implementation of the Russia-US agreements on Syria

The public sphere is recently actively used to force Anti-Russian rhetoric in the context of the Syrian crisis. There are attempts to diminish Russia's role and depict our country as the prime cause of all the troubles in Syria. It is speculated that Moscow counts on the military solution of the conflict. The aim of this campaign is simple – to conceal the true culprits of the failure of the CoH in Syria and disguise the true causes of the non-fulfillment of the Russia-US agreements.

The Russian Federation made a thorough fact-based comparative analysis of implementation of the Russia-US agreements, It includes all aspects such as compliance with and monitoring of CoH, granting of humanitarian access to besieged areas, joint fight against terrorism.

The conducted analysis clearly shows that Russia has responsibly fulfilled all of its obligations within the agreements in a timely manner. Here are some examples.

Russia guaranteed the implementation of the CoH by the Syrian government. The US on the other hand were not capable to insure the implementation of the CoH by the armed groups. From February to September the opposition groups that are supposed to be under the US control committed 2,031 violations of the CoH, which claimed lives of 3,532 military personnel and 12,800 civilians.

Furthermore, the US failed to fulfill their February promise to separate Al- Nusra Front from "moderate" opposition. Russia on the other hand since March has been prepared to transfer to Washington the maps showing the zones where according to our data the terrorists are holding territory. In the list of groups that confirmed their commitment to the CoH presented by Washington 2 belong to ISIS and 8 to the Al-Nusra Front. The American list is discredited by the inclusion of cutthroats from Ahrar al-Sham and Nour al-Din al-Zenki. Besides the US probably didn't receive any written guaranties to respect the CoH from the groups they allegedly control.

Washington failed to establish a valuable exchange of information about the CoH violations. In return for the detailed "on the ground" reports from Khmeimim Reconciliation Center (containing coordinates and evidence) the Russian side received "ranarounds" filled with information sourced from the mass media and social networks.

When it comes to the humanitarian access to East Aleppo the things are not any better. As it was agreed, Russia ensured the Syrian Governmental forces withdrawal from Castello, twice, on the 15th and 16th of October 2016. A SARC- manned check point for trucks inspection was established. The US failed in both cases.

This list can be continued.

Under these circumstances Russia took a decision to convey the comparative analysis of implementation of the Russia-US agreements to the public. The respective document was sent to the Office of the Special Envoy of the Secretary General for Syria S. de Mistura, to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, to K. Schwab, the executive chairman of the World Economic Forum, to Michael Moller, the Director-General of the United Nations Office at Geneva, to the Kofi Annan Foundation and to the Aga Khan Foundation.

We hope that the impartial, fact-based analysis will allow to shed some light on true reasons that hinder the Russia-US agreements implementation. With the agreement text available online, everyone can sort the things out and find the side which disrupted the implementation.

Russia is committed to achieve such aims as to overcome the military and political conflict in Syria, to stop violence and to put an end to the suffering of civilian population. This process entails simultaneous decisive fight against ISIS, Al-Nusra Front and the associated terrorist groups and provision of humanitarian access, recovery of sustained Intra-Syrian talks basing on the Security Council resolutions, decisions of ISSG and Geneva Communique dated 2012.

Russia is open for a continued cooperation in a wide range of areas of the settlement of the Syrian crisis with its partners, including the US. But this cooperation is only possible on the basis of equal rights and a principle of responsible discharge of the respective functions.


Source URL: https://russiaeu.ru/en/node/2447