Vasily Nebenzya: Syrian Forum in Sochi aims at Supporting UN-Sponsored Geneva Talks

UNITED NATIONS-The Syrian National Dialogue Congress to be held in Russia’s Black Sea resort of Sochi on January 29-30 is not an isolated event and is aimed at supporting the UN-sponsored intra-Syrian talks in Geneva, Russia’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Vasily Nebenzya said on Tuesday.

He also expressed hope the UN representatives would attend the forum in Sochi. “We assume it is in the interests of the United Nations to participate since [the forum in – TASS] Sochi is not an isolated event, and should contribute to the UN-sponsored process,” the diplomat said.

 According to Nebenzya, Moscow has repeatedly stressed that the National Dialogue Congress “is not an alternative” to the Geneva process as the Syrian [opposition] assumes. “We are telling it to all, from Secretary-General [of the UN Antonio Guterres] to [his Special Envoy for Syria] Staffan de Mistura, to all participants [of Geneva talks], Syrian government and [opposition] and other member-states,” he said, adding that the goal of the upcoming forum is to “enhance the UN-sponsored process in Geneva aimed at political settlement in Syria.”

The Syrian ceasefire guarantor nations, namely Russia, Iran and Turkey, reached an agreement to organize a Syrian national dialogue congress in Russia’s Black Sea resort city of Sochi on January 29-30 on December 22, 2017 at a regular international meeting on Syria in Kazakhstan’s capital city Astana. The congress is expected to focus on Syria’s new constitution and UN-monitored elections on its basis. In the end of December, around 40 armed groups headed by the so-called Free Syrian Army (FSA) refused to delegate their representatives to the congress in Sochi citing reconditions.  

Russia’s UN envoy calls situation in Raqqa humanitarian disaster

Nebenzya also said that the humanitarian situation in Syria’s Raqqa is close to a disaster, though everyone is putting the best face on matters.

“The humanitarian situation in Raqqa is awful, but everyone is playing it cool. Our American colleagues leveled the city to the ground as they were allegedly  fighting ISIS there, and currently the whole city is rigged with explosives, full of corpses of killed people, lacking water, electricity and any medical facilities. Nothing is going on, the city is not being restored, people cannot come back, living in awful unbelievable conditions in refugee camps,” the diplomat said.

According to Nebenzya, the current state of affairs in Raqqa is “a humanitarian situation close to a humanitarian disaster.” He added that western countries place emphasis on what is going on in the Syrian province of Idlib where the Syrian army is carrying out an operation against terrorists, and in Eastern Guta, a suburb of Damascus. “They discuss what they are interested in,” he noted.

H.M