Tag Archives: Syria

Kurdish moves on federalism cloud Syria peace drive

RMEILAN, Syria/GENEVA (Reuters) – Kurdish-controlled areas of northern Syria are expected to declare a federal system on Thursday, a move likely to further complicate peace talks in Geneva aimed at ending more than five years of war.

Russia pulled more warplanes out of Syria, a new delivery of humanitarian aid reached northern Aleppo province and U.N. mediator Staffan de Mistura named a Russian academic to his team of advisers in a nod to Moscow’s importance in brokering an end to the fighting.

But despite a more than two-week-old “cessation of hostilities” and Russian President Vladimir Putin’s decision to pull out some of his country’s forces that have tipped the balance of the war in Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s favor, any hopes of a breakthrough at the peace talks in Geneva remain slim.

Russia’s Defence Ministry on Wednesday reported 10 new ceasefire violations and the Kurds, after being excluded from the talks in Geneva, appeared to be taking matters into their own hands by drawing up plans to combine three Kurdish-led areas of northern Syrian into a federal arrangement.

The three areas already have de facto autonomy and while it was unclear what the new system would entail, there was no indication it would involve a separation from Syria.

The new arrangement, which a conference in the Kurdish-controlled town of Rmeilan agreed would be announced on Thursday, would alarm neighboring Turkey, which fears growing Kurdish sway in Syria is fuelling separatism among its own minority Kurds.

“Syria’s national unity and territorial integrity is fundamental for us. Outside of this, unilateral decisions cannot have validity,” a Turkish Foreign Ministry official said.

The United States said on Wednesday it opposed Syrian Kurds forming an autonomous region in northern Syria, but could accept such an arrangement if the Syrians collectively agreed on it.

The Syrian Kurdish YPG militia have been an important ally in the U.S.-led military campaign against Islamic State in Syria, and this has been a point of friction between the United States and its NATO ally Turkey.

However, Bashar Ja’afari, head of the Syrian delegation in Geneva, rejected any talk of a federal model for Syria and ruled out direct talks with the main opposition delegation. The main opposition group’s chief negotiator, Mohamad Alloush, said it had not yet decided whether it would hold direct negotiations with “the regime delegation”.

Ja’afari also said Putin’s announcement of a partial withdrawal of his armed forces on Monday had come as no surprise to the Syrian government, describing it as “common decision, taken both by President Putin and President Assad”.

SYRIA POSITION UNCHANGED

Some Western officials and commentators speculated Putin intended the partial withdrawal to force Damascus to soften its position at the talks to improve chances of progress, but Ja’afari signaled no change in its stance.

Yet Putin’s announcement surprised the West. He cited Russian military success in Syria as the reason for the drawdown, but his belief that the intervention delivered him a seat at the top table of world affairs may have tipped his hand.

De Mistura’s appointment of Vitaly Naumkin plays into this narrative. A former Soviet army officer, Naumkin is an expert on Islam and the Arab world and served as a moderator at earlier peace talks on Syria that were held in Moscow.

But talking about the latest round of talks last week, Naumkin told Russia’s RIA news agency: “There are no expectations. It is a difficult, complicated negotiation process.”

The Geneva talks are part of a diplomatic push launched with U.S. and Russian support to end a conflict that has killed more than 250,000 people, created the world’s worst refugee crisis, and allowed for the rise of Islamic State.

U.S.-Russian cooperation has already brought about a lull in the war via the “cessation of hostilities agreement”, though many violations have been reported.

The Russian Defence Ministry said on Wednesday that in the preceding 24 hours there had been four violations in Aleppo province, three in Latakia and one each in Idlib, Homs and Hama.

Opening the indirect talks on Monday, de Mistura said Syria faced a “moment of truth”, and he has described Putin’s decision to withdraw some Russian forces as a “significant development”.

Regional foes Saudi Arabia and Iran, which are deeply at odds over Syria, welcomed Putin’s move and the Arab League said it would help the U.N.-mediated talks to end the conflict.

Just under half of Russia’s fixed-wing strike force based in Syria has flown out in the past two days, according to Reuters calculations based on state television footage.

The precise number of planes that Russia kept at its Hmeymim base in Syria’s Latakia province is secret. But analysis of satellite imagery, air strikes and Defence Ministry statements suggested it had about 36 fixed-wing military warplanes there.

In the past two days, at least 15 of those planes – including Su-24, Su-25, Su-30 and Su-34 jets – have been seen on television flying out though Reuters could not independently verify the movements of the aircraft.

RUSSIAN JETS IN ACTION

Despite the partial withdrawal, Russian warplanes have been carrying out new sorties against positions belonging to Islamic State, which is not covered by the cessation of hostilities.

RIA said Russia had also started supplying weapons to Iraqi Kurds, including five Zu-23-2 anti-aircraft cannons and 20,000 shells for the cannons.

British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond said his country was not sure Putin’s drawdown announcement was genuine.

“We’ve seen before, in Ukraine, Russia talking about a withdrawal, and then it turned out to be merely a rotation of forces,” he said during a visit to Baghdad, adding he could not foresee “enduring peace” with Assad in power.

Moscow has rejected calls for Assad to be forced to step aside. He also still enjoys military backing from Iran, which has sent forces to Syria along with Lebanon’s Hezbollah.

The United States has also been carrying out air strikes in Syria. An Islamic State-linked website said the jihadist group had shot down a military plane near Kirkuk in Iraq, but U.S. officials said they knew nothing of such reports.

Under the cessation of hostilities, fresh humanitarian aid has reached areas hit by recent fighting. A new convoy of 26 trucks brought aid to about 13,000 families in northern Aleppo province, the Red Cross said.

The delivery by the Syrian Red Crescent to towns including Azaz, Afrin and Tal Rifaat was the largest in the area for weeks, Red Cross spokesman Pawel Krzysiek said. Clinics had been resupplied in the meantime, he said.

On the second day of talks in Geneva on Tuesday, opposition negotiators demanded that the government detail its thoughts on a political transition in Syria and said there had been no progress on freeing detainees.

The moves in Rmeilan, which was discussing a “Democratic Federal System for Rojava – Northern Syria”, further complicated hopes of progress in Geneva. Rojava is the Kurdish name for northern Syria.

Syrian Kurds effectively control an uninterrupted stretch of 250 miles along the Syrian-Turkish border from the Euphrates River to the frontier with Iraq, where Iraqi Kurds have enjoyed autonomy since the early 1990s. They also hold a separate section of the northwestern border in the Afrin area.

(Additional reporting by John Davison and Dominic Evans, Tom Perry, Rodi Said in Rmeilan, Syria, Tom Miles in Geneva, Angus MacDowall in Riyadh, Mostafa Hashem in Cairo, Tulay Karadeniz in Istanbul, Bozorgmehr Sharafedin in Dubai, Andrew Osborn in Moscow, and Arshad Mohammed in Washington; Writing by Timothy Heritage; Editing by Pravin Char, Don Durfee and G Crosse)

Russian warplanes leave Syria, raising U.N. hopes for peace talks

MOSCOW/BEIRUT/GENEVA (Reuters) – Russian warplanes flew home from Syria on Tuesday as Moscow started to withdraw forces that have tipped the war President Bashar al-Assad’s way, and the U.N. envoy said he hoped the move would help peace talks in Geneva.

As the first aircraft touched down in Russia, U.N. envoy Staffan de Mistura called President Vladimir Putin’s surprise move a “significant development” toward resolving a conflict which this week passes its fifth anniversary.

Assad’s opponents hope Putin’s announcement on Monday that most Russian forces would be withdrawn signaled a shift in his support. However, its full significance is not yet clear: Russia is keeping an air base and undeclared number of forces in Syria.

Russian jets were in action against Islamic State on Tuesday. Assad also still enjoys military backing from Iran, which has sent forces to Syria along with Lebanon’s Hezbollah.

Russia said last month Assad was out of step with its diplomacy, prompting speculation Putin is pushing him to be more flexible at the Geneva talks, where his government has ruled out discussion of the presidency or a negotiated transfer of power.

Damascus has dismissed any talk of differences with its ally and says the planned withdrawal was coordinated and the result of army gains on the ground.

British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond, whose government supports the opposition, indicated the gaps in Western understanding of Putin, saying he had “no insight at all into Russia’s strategy” after a decision that came out of the blue.

The West had been equally surprised by Putin’s decision to intervene. “Unfortunately none of us knows what the intent of Mr Putin is when he carries out any action, which is why he is a very difficult partner in any situation like this,” Hammond said.

Analysts in Moscow said Putin’s acquisition of a seat at the diplomatic top table may have motivated his move to scale back his costly Syria campaign.

“MOMENT OF TRUTH”

Russia appeared to be following through on its pledge, the U.S. White House said, but spokesman Josh Earnest said it was too early to assess the broader implications, adding Moscow did not give the United States direct notice of its withdrawal plan.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry welcomed Putin’s announcement and said he planned to visit Moscow next week for what he called the best opportunity in years to end the war.

The Geneva talks are part of a diplomatic push launched with U.S.-Russian support to end a conflict that has killed more than 250,000 people, created the world’s worst refugee crisis, and allowed for the rise of Islamic State. Opening the indirect talks, de Mistura said Syria faced a “moment of truth”.

U.S.-Russian cooperation has already brought about a lull in the war via a “cessation of hostilities agreement”, though many violations have been reported.

Opposition negotiators demanded on Tuesday that the government spell out its thoughts about a political transition in Syria, saying there had been no progress on freeing detainees, who were being executed at a rate of 50 a day.

The opposition High Negotiations Committee (HNC) used their first meeting in the round of peace talks to give de Mistura a set of general principles to guide the transition.

A peace process for Syria endorsed by the U.N. Security Council in December calls for a Syrian-led process that establishes “credible, inclusive and non-sectarian governance”, a new constitution, and free, fair elections within 18 months.

The HNC wants Assad out of power by the start of a transition. While some rebels have expressed guarded optimism at Putin’s announcement, others doubt he is about to put serious pressure on Assad.

“We do not trust them,” said Fadi Ahmad of the First Coastal Division, who says his rebel group has been fighting a Russian-backed government offensive near the Turkish border throughout the cessation agreement that came into effect on Feb. 27.

The Syrian government, which had been losing territory to rebels before Russia intervened, had indicated it was in no mood to give ground to the opposition on the eve of the talks that started on Monday, calling the presidency a “red line”.

PILOTS WELCOMED, RUSSIAN JETS STAGE STRIKES

Russian television showed the first group of Su-34 jets landing from Syria at a base in the south of the country.

The pilots were greeted by 200-300 servicemen, journalists, and their wives and daughters, waving Russian flags, balloons in red white and blue, and flowers. They were mobbed and thrown in the air by the crowd. A brass band played Soviet military songs and the national anthem. Two priests paraded a religious icon.

Russia flew more than 9,000 sorties during the Syrian operation, according to Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu. Military officials say they destroyed arms dumps, weapons and fuel supplies being used by what they called terrorists.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which reports on the war using sources on the ground, says Russian air strikes have killed more than 1,700 civilians. Moscow denies that.

Showing Russian warplanes were still active in Syria, heavy air support was reported helping the Syrian army make major gains against Islamic State near the ancient city of Palmyra. IS is not included in the cessation of hostilities.

At least 26 people were killed east of the Islamic State-held city on Tuesday, the British-based Observatory reported.

“MESSAGE TO ASSAD”

Putin said Russia had largely fulfilled its objectives in a campaign which has so far cost Russia $700-$800 million according to a Reuters estimate, an additional financial burden at a time of low oil prices.

Russia, which has haunting memories of the long Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, said it would be keeping its most advanced air defense system, the S-400, in Syria.

A Western diplomat said Putin would “now move to focus on the peace talks and this will put pressure on the Syrian government to negotiate”. The diplomat added: “We don’t know if he is giving up on Assad but we know that the Russians are delivering a message to Assad that they are keen on negotiations over transition to proceed.”

Moscow has said it is up to the Syrian people, not outside powers, to decide Assad’s future. Even Assad’s enemies in the West have moved away from demanding he leave power immediately.

In Geneva, U.N. war crimes investigators on Syria said lower-level perpetrators should be prosecuted by foreign authorities until senior military and political figures can be brought before international justice.

The U.N. Commission of Inquiry, which has documented atrocities by all sides, has compiled a confidential list of suspects and maintains a database with 5,000 interviews.

“The adoption of measures that lay the ground for accountability need not and should not wait for a final peace agreement to be reached,” Paulo Pinheiro, chief of the inquiry panel, told the U.N. Human Rights Council.

(Additional reporting by Dominic Evans, Lisa Barrington, Stephanie Nebehay, Suleiman al-Khalidi, Samia Nakhoul, Tom Miles, William James, Jason Bush and Jack Stubbs; Writing by Tom Perry and Philippa Fletcher, editing by Peter Millership and David Stamp)

Putin says Russians to start withdrawing from Syria as peace talks resume

MOSCOW/GENEVA (Reuters) – President Vladimir Putin said on Monday “the main part” of Russian armed forces in Syria would start to withdraw, and instructed his diplomats to step up the push for peace as U.N.-mediated talks resumed in Geneva on ending the five-year war.

Syria announced President Bashar al-Assad had agreed on the “reduction” of Russian forces in a telephone call with Putin. Western diplomats urged caution and the anti-Assad opposition expressed bafflement, with a spokesman saying “nobody knows what is in Putin’s mind”.

Russia’s military intervention in Syria in September helped to turn the tide of war in Assad’s favor after months of gains in western Syria by rebel fighters, who were aided by foreign military supplies including U.S.-made anti-tank missiles.

Putin’s announcement – made without any advance warning to the United States – dropped out of the blue.

At a meeting with his defense and foreign ministers, Putin said Russian forces had largely fulfilled their objectives in Syria. But he gave no deadline for the completion of the withdrawal and said forces would remain at a seaport and airbase in Syria’s Latakia province.

In Geneva, United Nations mediator Staffan de Mistura warned the warring parties there was no “Plan B” other than a resumption of conflict if the first of three rounds of talks which aim to agree a “clear roadmap” for Syria failed to make progress.

Putin said at the Kremlin meeting he was ordering the withdrawal from Tuesday of “the main part of our military contingent” from the country.

“The effective work of our military created the conditions for the start of the peace process,” he said. “I believe that the task put before the defense ministry and Russian armed forces has, on the whole, been fulfilled.”

With the participation of the Russian military, Syrian armed forces “have been able to achieve a fundamental turnaround in the fight against international terrorism”, he added.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Putin had telephoned the Syrian president to inform him of the decision, but the two leaders had not discussed Assad’s future – the biggest obstacle to reaching a peace agreement.

The move was announced on the day United Nations-brokered talks involving the warring sides in Syria resumed in Geneva.

Moscow gave Washington no advance warning of Putin’s announcement, two U.S. officials said. Speaking on condition of anonymity, they added that they had seen no indications so far of preparations by Russia’s military for the withdrawal.

In Damascus, the Syrian presidency said Assad had agreed to the reduction in the Russian air force presence after it had helped the Syrian army to make military gains. However, a statement from the presidency added that Moscow had promised to continue support for Syria in “confronting terrorism”.

Syria regards all rebel groups fighting Assad as terrorists.

Rebels and opposition officials alike reacted cautiously to Putin’s comments.

“I don’t understand the Russian announcement, it’s a surprise, like the way they entered the war. God protect us,” Fadi Ahmad, spokesman for the First Coastal Division, a Free Syria Army group fighting in the country’s northwest, told Reuters.

Opposition spokesman Salim al-Muslat demanded a total Russian withdrawal. “Nobody knows what is in Putin’s mind, but the point is he has no right to be in be our country in the first place. Just go,” he said.

A European diplomat was also skeptical. “It has the potential to put a lot of pressure on Assad and the timing fits that,” said the diplomat.

“However, I say potentially because we’ve seen before with Russia that what’s promised isn’t always what happens.”

MOMENT OF TRUTH

The Geneva talks are the first in more than two years and come amid a marked reduction in fighting after last month’s “cessation of hostilities”, sponsored by Washington and Moscow and accepted by Assad’s government and many of his foes.

Russia’s U.N. ambassador Vitaly Churkin confirmed some forces would stay in Syria. “Our military presence will continue to be there, it will be directed mostly at making sure that the ceasefire, the cessation of hostilities, is maintained,” he told reporters at the United Nations in New York.

However, he added: “Our diplomacy has received marching orders to intensify our efforts to achieve a political settlement in Syria.”

Speaking before Putin’s announcement, de Mistura said Syria faced a moment of truth, as he opened talks to end a war which has displaced half the population, sent refugees streaming into Europe and turned Syria into a battlefield for foreign forces and jihadis.

The limited truce, which excludes the powerful Islamic State and Nusra Front groups, is fragile. The warring sides have accused each other of multiple violations, and they arrived in Geneva with what look like irreconcilable agendas.

The Syrian opposition says the talks must focus on setting up a transitional governing body with full executive power, and that Assad must leave power at the start of the transition. Damascus says Assad’s opponents are deluded if they think they will take power at the negotiating table.

The head of the government delegation, Bashar Ja’afari, described his first meeting with de Mistura on Monday as positive and constructive, adding he submitted a document entitled “Basic Elements for a Political Solution”.

In a sign of how wide the rift is, de Mistura is meeting the two sides separately – at least initially. The talks must focus on political transition, which is the “mother of all issues”, the U.N. envoy said.

Separate groups would keep tackling humanitarian issues and the cessation of hostilities. “As far as I know, the only Plan B available is return to war, and to even worse war than we had so far,” he said.

PAST FAILURES

Several ceasefires and peace talks have been attempted since the conflict, which has killed 250,000 people, broke out five years ago this week.

Hundreds of U.N. monitors were deployed to observe a ceasefire in Syria in 2012, but pulled out after fighting resumed. Peace talks in Geneva two years ago collapsed after making no progress.

De Mistura said that if he saw no willingness to negotiate in this latest search for a political agreement, he would hand the issue “back to those who have influence, and that is the Russian Federation, the USA … and to the Security Council”.

The reduction in fighting has allowed aid to be brought to besieged areas, though the opposition says the deliveries to rebel-held territory fall well short of needs.

(Additional reporting by Phil Stewart, Arshad Mohammed, Michelle Nichols, Tom Miles, Tom Perry and Stephanie Nebehay; writing by Dominic Evans and David Stamp; editing by Peter Millership)

Syrian war creates child refugees and child soldiers, report shows

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Syria’s five-year-old conflict has created 2.4 million child refugees, killed many and led to the recruitment of children as fighters, some as young as seven, U.N. children’s fund UNICEF said on Monday.

Its report “No Place for Children” said more than 8 million children in Syria and neighboring countries needed humanitarian assistance, with the international response plan for Syria chronically underfunded.

“Twice as many people now live under siege or in hard-to-reach areas compared with 2013. At least two million of those cut off from assistance are children, including more than 200,000 in areas under siege,” it said.

The U.N. says more than 450,000 people are under siege. Cases of starvation have been reported this year in areas surrounded by government forces and their allies near Damascus, and by Islamic State in eastern Syria.

Violence continues despite a fragile cessation of hostilities reached last month.

UNICEF said 400 children were killed in 2015. A separate report on Friday by a number of aid groups, including Oxfam, said U.N. figures showed at least 50,000 people had been killed since April 2014.

CHILD SOLDIERS, NO SCHOOL

“A trend of particular concern is the increase in child recruitment,” UNICEF said.

“Children report being actively encouraged to join the war by parties to the conflict offering gifts and ‘salaries’ of up to $400 a month.”

Since 2014, warring sides have recruited younger children, it said, some as young as seven. More than half of children recruited in cases UNICEF verified in 2015 were under 15.

Children have been filmed executing prisoners in grisly propaganda videos by the Islamic State group.

Outside Syria, 306,000 Syrian children have been born as refugees, it said. U.N. refugee agency UNHCR says nearly 70,000 Syrian refugee children have been born in Lebanon alone.

UNICEF said 3.7 million children had been born since the conflict began, a third of all Syrian children.

Some 2.8 million Syrian children in Syria or neighboring countries are not attending school. Dozens of schools and hospitals were attacked in 2015, according to aid groups.

“Half of all medical staff have fled Syria and only one third of hospitals are functional. Each doctor used to look after the needs of around 600 people – now it’s up to 4,000,” UNICEF said.

Syria’s neighbors host the vast majority of its 4.8 million refugees. Europe hosts an eighth of the number residing in those countries, it said.

The separate joint aid agency report, “Fuelling the fire”, criticized world powers including Russia, Britain, the United States, France, Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Iran, which had “intensified their military engagement in Syria”.

“To varying degrees, these states – which should play a key role in ending the suffering in Syria – are actively contributing to that very suffering,” it said.

U.N.-brokered peace talks open on Monday in Geneva to seek an end to a conflict that has killed more than 250,000 people.

(Reporting by John Davison; Editing by Andrew Roche and Toby Chopra)

Border attack feeds Tunisia fears of Libya jihadist spillover

TUNIS/ALGIERS (Reuters) – The signal to attack came from the mosque, sending dozens of Islamist fighters storming through the Tunisian town of Ben Guerdan to hit army and police posts in street battles that lit the dawn sky with tracer bullets.

Militants used a megaphone to chant “God is Great,” and reassure residents they were Islamic State, there to save the town near the Libyan border from the “tyrant” army. Most were Tunisians themselves, with local accents, and even some familiar faces, officials and witnesses to Monday’s attack said.

Hours later, 36 militants were dead, along with 12 soldiers and seven civilians, in an assault authorities described as an attempt by Islamic State to carve out terrain in Tunisia.

Whether Islamic State aimed to hold territory as they have in Iraq, Syria and Libya, or intended only to dent Tunisia’s already battered security, is unclear and the group has yet to officially claim the attack.

But as fuller details of the Ben Guerdan fighting emerge, the incident highlights the risk Tunisia faces from home-grown jihadists drawn to Iraq, Syria and Libya, and who have threatened to bring their war back home.

Despite Tunisian forces’ preparations to confront returning fighters, and their defeat of militants in Ben Guerdan, Monday’s assault shows how the country is vulnerable to violence spilling over from Libya as Islamic State expands there.

Authorities are still investigating the Ben Guerdan attack. But most of the militants appear to have been already in the town, with a few brought in from Libya. Arms caches were deposited around the city before the assault.

“Most of them were from Ben Guerdan, we know their faces. They knew where to find the house of the counter-terrorist police chief,” one witness, Sabri Ben Saleh, told Reuters. “They were driving round in a car filled with weapons, my neighbors said they knew some of them.”

Troops have killed 14 more militants around Ben Guerdan since Monday. Others have been arrested and more weapons seized.

ISLAMIC STATE

Officials say they are still determining if the militants had been in Libya before or had returned from fighting with Islamic State overseas. But that such a large number of militants and arms were in Tunisia is no surprise.

After its revolt in 2011 to topple Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali, Tunisia has struggled with growing Islamic militancy.

More than 3,000 Tunisians have left to fight with Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, according to government estimates. Tunisian security sources say many are with Islamic State in Libya.

Gunmen trained in Libya were blamed for attacks on tourists at the Bardo Museum in Tunis a year ago and at a beach hotel in Sousse in June.

Tunisians also play a major role in Islamic State in Libya where they run training camps, according to Tunisian security sources.

But the scale of Monday’s attack was unprecedented. The militants were well-organized, handing out weapons to their fighters from a vehicle moving through the city, with knowledge of the town and its military barracks.

“We came across a group of terrorists with their Kalashnikovs, and they told us: ‘Don’t worry we are not here to target you. We are the Islamic State and we are here for the tyrants in the army,'” said Hassein Taba, a local resident.

The attack tests Tunisia at a difficult time. After Islamic State violence last year, the tourism industry that represents 7 percent of the economy is struggling to tempt visitors to return.

With its new constitution, free elections and secular history, Tunisia is a target for jihadists looking to upset a young democracy just five years after the overthrow of dictator Ben Ali.

“The battle of Ben Guerdane in Tunisia, 20 miles from the Libyan border … is proof enough that the Islamic State has cells far and wide,” said Geoff Porter, at North Africa Risk Consulting. “But what these cells can reliably do … and how they are directed by Islamic State leadership in Sirte, let alone in Iraq and Syria, is not known.”

AIR STRIKES

Islamic State has grown in Libya over the past year and half, coopting local fighters, battling with rivals and taking over the town of Sirte, now its main base.

That has worried Tunisian authorities, who have built a border trench and tightened controls along nearly 200-km (125 miles) of the frontier with Libya.

Western military experts are training Tunisians to protect a porous border where smuggling has been a long tradition. Ben Guerdan is well-known as a smuggling town.

“There are still some blind spots in intelligence, but they are advancing with the cooperation of neighboring countries and with the West,” said Ali Zarmdini, a Tunisian military analyst.

But Tunisia’s North African neighbors worry about the spill over impact of any further Western air strikes and military action against Islamic State in Libya.

After a U.S. air strike killed 40 mostly Tunisian militants in the Libyan town of Sabratha last month, Tunisian forces went on alert for any cross-border incursions.

Just days before the Ben Guerdan attack, Tunisian troops killed five militants who tried to cross from Libya.

But the fact that even after that setback, militants mustered a force of 50 fighters to strike the town shows the group’s ability to keep testing the Tunisian military.

(Writing by Patrick Markey; Editing by Giles Elgood)

U.N. talks aim for Syria roadmap, no ‘Plan B’ but war

GENEVA (Reuters) – A U.N. mediator said on Monday there was no “Plan B” other than a resumption of conflict in the Syrian war if the first of three rounds of talks which aim to agree a “clear roadmap” for Syria fail to make progress.

Syria faces a moment of truth, Staffan de Mistura said when he opened talks to end a five-year war which has displaced half the population, sent refugees streaming into Europe and turned Syria into a battlefield for foreign forces and jihadis.

The talks are the first in more than two years and come amid a marked reduction in fighting after last month’s “cessation of hostilities”, sponsored by Washington and Moscow and accepted by President Bashar al-Assad’s government and many of his foes.

But the limited truce, which excludes the powerful Islamic State and Nusra Front groups, is fragile. Both sides have accused each other of multiple violations, and they arrived in Geneva with what look like irreconcilable agendas.

The Syrian opposition says the talks must focus on setting up a transitional governing body with full executive power, and that Assad must leave power at the start of the transition. Damascus says Assad’s opponents are deluded if they think they will take power at the negotiating table.

The head of the government delegation, Bashar Ja’afari, described his first meeting with de Mistura on Monday as positive and constructive, adding he submitted a document entitled “Basic Elements for a Political Solution”.

De Mistura said some ideas had been floated in a meeting he described as a preparatory session, ahead of a further meeting on Wednesday which would focus on core issues. Asked about the gulf between the two teams, he said it was the nature of negotiations that both sides start off with tough positions.

In a sign of how wide that gulf is, de Mistura is meeting the two sides separately – at least initially.

The talks must focus on political transition, which is the “mother of all issues”, the U.N. envoy said before his talks with Ja’afari. Separate groups would keep tackling humanitarian issues and the cessation of hostilities.

“As far as I know, the only Plan B available is return to war, and to even worse war than we had so far,” he said.

PAST FAILURES

Several ceasefires and peace talks have been attempted since the conflict, which has killed 250,000 people, broke out five years ago this week.

Hundreds of U.N. peacekeepers deployed to Syria in 2012, but pulled out after fighting resumed. Peace talks in Geneva two years ago collapsed after making no progress.

De Mistura said that if he saw no willingness to negotiate in this latest search for a political agreement, he would hand the issue “back to those who have influence, and that is the Russian Federation, the USA … and to the Security Council”.

Russia’s military intervention in Syria in September helped turn the tide of war in Assad’s favor after months of gains in western Syria by rebel fighters, who were aided by foreign military supplies including U.S.-made anti-tank missiles.

The reduction in fighting has allowed aid to be brought to besieged areas, though the opposition says the deliveries to rebel-held territory fall well short of needs.

Clashes have taken place on many fronts. Government forces and allies on Monday fought insurgents including Islamist groups in western Syria, such as Latakia and Homs provinces, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Observatory director Rami Abdulrahman said there had been a general rise in the daily death toll after an initial drop that occurred at the start of the truce.

In the northern province of Aleppo, Kurdish forces fought with fighters from Islamist factions while rebel forces battled Islamic State militants, the Observatory said.

The emergence of Islamic State in eastern Syria and across the border in Iraq led Washington and its Western and Arab allies to launch an air campaign against the ultra-hardline Islamist group in 2014.

“CLEAR ROADMAP”

The opposition are holding out little hope that Geneva will bring them nearer to their goal of toppling Assad, accusing the government of preparing for more war. They also fear that the international focus on confronting Islamic State has led Washington to soften its opposition to the Syrian president.

Rebels say they are ready to fight on despite their recent defeats. They hope foreign backers – notably Saudi Arabia – will send them more powerful weapons including anti-aircraft missiles if the political process collapses.

The first round of talks are scheduled to run until around March 24, followed by a break of 7-10 days, then a second round of at least two weeks before another recess and a third round.

“By then we believe we should have at least a clear roadmap,” de Mistura said. “I’m not saying agreement, but a clear roadmap because that’s what Syria is expecting from all of us.”

He did not mention whether Kurdish leaders would be involved for the first time, but said that the “proximity” format of indirect talks gave him flexibility to hear as many voices as possible, and all Syrians should be given a chance.

The main Kurdish YPG militia, which controls a swathe of northern Syria and is backed by the United States in combat with Islamic State fighters, has so far been excluded from talks in line with the views of Turkey, which considers it a terrorist group.

“The rule of the game will be inclusiveness,” de Mistura said. “In fact, the list of those whom we are going to consult or meet, or will be part of — eventually, I hope — not only of proximity negotiations but in fact direct negotiations is going to be constantly updated.”

(Writing by Dominic Evans, editing by Peter Millership)

Mississippi man pleads guilty to trying to join Islamic State

(Reuters) – A Mississippi man pleaded guilty in federal court on Friday to attempting to join Islamic State in Syria with his wife last summer.

Muhammad Oda Dakhlalla, 23, and Jaelyn Delshaun Young, 20, were arrested at a Mississippi airport in August 2015, while attempting to board a flight to Turkey, where they believed an Islamic State contact would convey them to Syria, according to court documents filed by U.S. prosecutors.

Young, who has not pleaded guilty and is scheduled to go to trial in June, acknowledged her role as the “planner of the expedition” in an incriminating farewell letter, the documents said.

Dakhlalla entered his guilty plea in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi, in Greenville.

In exchange for Dakhlalla’s guilty plea to a single count of conspiring to provide material support to a designated terrorist organization, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison, U.S. prosecutors agreed to not press any other charges.

Both Dakhlalla and Young, of Starkville, Mississippi, are U.S. citizens. Young converted to Islam in March 2015, according to the court documents.

Dakhlalla and Young are two of more than 80 individuals whom the United States has charged with Islamic State-related crimes since 2013.

Young’s Twitter posts about her desire to join Islamic State caught the attention of the FBI in May 2015, and an agent posing as an Islamic State recruiter began corresponding with her and Dakhlalla.

The couple, who had married in an Islamic marriage but did not get their marriage legally recognized, were motivated to join the group after viewing Islamic State executions of people they deemed immoral, and because they perceived the group as “liberators” of parts of Syria and Iraq, according to court records.

Attorneys for the couple said in court that when they were first charged, they had no weapons nor military training and would not pose a threat to others if released on bond.

(Reporting by Julia Harte)

Syria opposition to attend Geneva peace talks, but says Assad escalating war

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Syria’s main opposition group said it would attend peace talks on Monday but accused the government of President Bashar al-Assad of preparing to escalate the war to strengthen its negotiating position.

The U.N.-brokered talks, which coincide with the fifth anniversary of the conflict, will take place in Geneva two weeks after the start of a ceasefire agreement.

The truce deal has reduced violence although not halted the fighting, with further hostilities reported in western Syria on Friday.

The High Negotiations Committee said it would attend the peace talks as part of its “commitment to international efforts to stop the spilling of Syrian blood and find a political solution”.

But in its statement on Friday it played down any chance of reaching agreement with the Syrian government to end the war that has killed more than 250,000 people and led to a refugee crisis in the Middle East and Europe.

Russia said it expected its ally Syria to attend, although Damascus has yet to publicly confirm it will do so. The Syrian foreign minister is expected to announce his government’s position on the talks on Saturday.

Peace talks convened two years ago collapsed because the sides were unable to agree an agenda: Damascus wanted a focus on fighting terrorism, the term it uses for the rebellion, while the opposition wanted to discuss a transitional government.

The latest talks are intended to focus on future political arrangements in Syria, a new constitution and elections, U.N. envoy Staffan de Mistura said.

The opposition HNC said it wanted the talks to concentrate on the establishment of an interim governing body with full executive powers.

HNC coordinator Riad Hijab said the group was “concerned with representing the just cause of the Syrian people … and investing in all available chances to alleviate the Syrian people’s suffering”.

“We know that they (the government) are committing crimes, and that they are preparing an air and ground escalation in the coming period,” he said, without elaborating.

HNC spokesman Salim al-Muslat said they expected a government escalation with the aim of strengthening Damascus’s position at the negotiating table.

“I believe this is a strategy,” he said.

“FAILING PROJECT”

A prominent Syrian dissident who is not part of the Saudi-backed HNC, Haytham Manna, said he would stay away from the talks, which he regarded as a “failing project”.

Manna, co-leader of the Syrian Democratic Council that includes Kurdish members, boycotted the last round of talks because the Kurds were not included.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said however that de Mistura should this time include representatives of Kurdish groups, which have been fighting in Syria.

Kurdish groups such as the PYD party and its affiliated YPG militia have not been invited so far. Regional power Turkey does not want them in Geneva and views the YPG as a terrorist group. Russia says the Kurds are a legitimate part of a future Syria, and should be at the table.

There has been speculation that they will be included in the coming round. De Mistura says he has not expanded the list of invitees, but the talks’ format gives him flexibility to consult whomever he wants.

PYD co-chair Saleh Muslim said Kurds should be included for any political settlement to work.

“We believe that if we are not present, the process will not be completed in the right way,” he said.

The cessation of hostilities agreement which came into force on Feb. 27 does not include the two main jihadist groups, Islamic State and the Nusra Front.

A source close to the government said the Syrian army, backed by Russian air strikes, is aiming to capture the historic city of Palmyra from Islamic State and open a road to the eastern province of Deir al-Zor, where the jihadists are also established.

The Russian air force has hit Palmyra with dozens of air strikes since Wednesday, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group.

Syrian government forces were on Friday battling Islamic State 7 km (4 miles) from the ancient site that fell to the jihadists last May.

Islamic State has blown up ancient temples and tombs since capturing Palmyra in what the U.N. cultural agency UNESCO has called a war crime.

The capture of Palmyra and further eastward advances into Deir al-Zor would mark the most significant Syrian government gain against Islamic State since the start of the Russian intervention last September.

Warplanes also hit areas of western Syria on Friday, the Observatory said. An air raid by the government side killed at least five people in a rebel-held area of Aleppo.

It also reported clashes between insurgents and government forces in the northern Latakia countryside.

In northern Aleppo province clashes continued between Kurdish fighters and insurgents, in a fight that has pitted the YPG and its allies against rebels supported through Turkey.

(Additional reporting by Tom Perry, Lisa Barrington, Tom Miles, Denis Dyomkin and Alexander Winning; Writing by Giles Elgood; Editing by Pravin Char)

Syrian army aims for eastward advance with Palmyra attack

BEIRUT (Reuters) – The Syrian army backed by Russian air strikes is aiming to capture the historic city of Palmyra from Islamic State to open a road to the eastern province of Deir al-Zor in an offensive that got under way this week, a source close to the Syrian government said.

The Russian air force has hit Palmyra with dozens of air strikes since Wednesday, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group. Syrian government forces were on Friday battling Islamic State some 4 miles from the ancient site that fell to the jihadists last May.

Observatory Director Rami Abdulrahman described it as a large-scale assault, calling it a “real operation to retake control”. The source close to Damascus said the aim was to “seize the road from Tadmur (Palmyra) to Deir al-Zor”.

Islamic State has blown up ancient temples and tombs since capturing Palmyra in what the U.N. cultural agency UNESCO has called a war crime. The city, located at a crossroads in central Syria, is surrounded mostly by desert.

The Islamic State group is not included in a cessation of hostilities agreement that took effect on Feb. 27 and has brought about a lull in fighting between the government and rebels battling President Bashar al-Assad in western Syria.

Since the Russian air force intervened in support of Assad last September, tilting the military balance his way, Western states have criticized Moscow for directing most of its air strikes at rebels in western Syria rather than IS.

The capture of Palmrya and further eastward advances into Islamic State-held Deir al-Zor would mark the most significant Syrian government gain against IS since the start of the Russian intervention. With Russia’s help, Damscus has already taken back some ground from IS, notably east of Aleppo.

ISLAMIC STATE LOSING MOMENTUM

The momentum has turned against Islamic State since its rapid advances two years ago following the capture of the Iraqi city of Mosul. Its finances are also under strain, with fighters’ pay cut by up to a half.

The group’s tactics in Syria appear to reflect the strains, as it turns to suicide missions seemingly aimed at causing maximum casualties rather than sustainable territorial gains.

Russian air power has helped government troops backed on the ground by Lebanon’s Hezbollah and the Iranian Revolutionary Guards to advance in strategically vital areas of western Syria where fighting has largely subsided due to the truce.

The source close to the Syrian government said the bulk of the forces mobilized for the Palmyra offensive were from the Syrian army. The source, who is non-Syrian but familiar with military events in Syria, was speaking anonymously because of the sensitivity of the matter.

Abdulrahman of the Observatory said at least 32 Islamic State fighters were killed on Thursday in the Palmyra area. Syrian military officials could not be reached for comment.

Islamic State is being fought in Syria in two separate campaigns: on the one hand by the Syrian government and its allies, and on the other by a U.S.-led alliance that is working with Syrian groups including the Kurdish YPG militia.

The group captured nearly all of Deir al-Zor province after seizing the Iraqi city of Mosul in 2014. The Syrian government, however, still controls part of the city of Deir al-Zor, which is besieged by Islamic State fighters, and a nearby air base.

(Reporting by Tom Perry, editing by Peter Millership)

Key powers mulling possibility of federal division of Syria

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – Major powers close to U.N.-brokered peace talks on Syria are discussing the possibility of a federal division of the war-torn country that would maintain its unity as a single state while granting broad autonomy to regional authorities, diplomats said.

The resumption of Geneva peace talks is coinciding with the fifth anniversary of a conflict that began with protests against President Bashar al-Assad before descending into a multi-sided civil war that has drawn in foreign governments and allowed the growth of Islamic State militants in Syria and Iraq.

Fighting in Syria has slowed considerably since a fragile “cessation of hostilities agreement” brokered by the United States and Russia came into force almost two weeks ago. But an actual peace deal and proper ceasefire remain elusive.

As the United Nations’ peace mediator Staffan de Mistura prepares to meet with delegations from the Syrian government and opposition, one of the ideas receiving serious attention at the moment is a possible federal division of Syria.

Neither the opposition nor government has confirmed its participation in the latest round of peace talks in Switzerland.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, a U.N. Security Council diplomat said some major Western powers, not only Russia, have also been considering the possibility of a federal structure for Syria and have passed on ideas to de Mistura.

“While insisting on retaining the territorial integrity of Syria, so continuing to keep it as a single country, of course there are all sorts of different models of a federal structure that would, in some models, have a very, very loose center and a lot of autonomy for different regions,” the diplomat said.

He offered no details about the models of a federal division of authority that could be applied to Syria. Another council diplomat confirmed the remarks.

OPPOSITION DISLIKES FEDERALISM

The biggest sticking point in the peace talks remains the fate of Assad, who Western and Gulf Arab governments insist must go at the end of a transition period envisioned under a roadmap hammered out in Vienna last year by major powers. Assad’s backers Russia and Iran say Syrians themselves must decide.

After five years of civil war that has killed 250,000 people and driven some 11 million from their homes, Syria’s territory is already effectively split between various parties, including the government and its allies, Western-backed Kurds, opposition groups and Islamic State militants.

This week, Syria’s Saudi Arabian-backed opposition rejected a suggestion by Russia, which like Iran supports Assad’s government and has intervened militarily on its side, that the peace talks could agree a federal structure for the country.

“Any mention of this federalism or something which might present a direction for dividing Syria is not acceptable at all. We have agreed we will expand non-central government in a future Syria, but not any kind of federalism or division,” Syrian opposition coordinator Riad Hijab said.

But the idea of federalism for Syria has not been ruled out. In an interview with Al Jazeera on Thursday, de Mistura said “all Syrians have rejected division (of Syria) and federalism can be discussed at the negotiations.”

In a September interview Assad did not rule out the idea of federalism when asked about it, but said any change must be a result of dialogue among Syrians and a referendum to introduce the necessary changes to the constitution.

“From our side, when the Syrian people are ready to move in a certain direction, we will naturally agree to this,” he said at the time.

The co-leader of Syrian Kurdish PYD party, which exercises wide influence over Kurdish areas of Syria, has made clear the PYD was open to the idea.

“What you call it isn’t important,” PYD’s Saleh Muslim told Reuters on Tuesday. “We have said over and over again that we want a decentralized Syria – call it administrations, call it federalism – everything is possible.”

The next round of Syria peace talks is not expected to run beyond March 24. After that round ends, there is expected to be a break of a week or 10 days before they resume.

(Additional reporting by Lisa Barrington and Tom Perry in Beirut and Tom Miles in Geneva; Editing by James Dalgleish)