Tag Archives: Syria

Syria truce offers glimpses of normality

AMMAN (Reuters) – In the devastated Syrian city of Aleppo, children are outside playing and many people are going to the shops safely for the first time in months thanks to a partial halt to the war that is providing relief even if most doubt that peace will take hold.

“Look at the markets. Where were all these people hiding?” said a bewildered Mahmoud Ashrafi, speaking to Reuters by telephone after picking through opposition-held areas of Aleppo wrecked by barrel bombs and air strikes.

While the “cessation of hostilities” has fallen short of halting the five-year-long war across the country, parts of Syria have enjoyed an unusual period of peace since the U.S.-Russian agreement came into effect on Saturday.

The United Nations hopes the agreement will allow for peace talks to get under way towards settling the conflict that has killed more than 250,000 people and created refugee crises in the Middle East and Europe. More aid has been delivered into opposition-held areas since the agreement came into effect.

Just a few weeks ago, Syrians in opposition-held parts of Aleppo were trying to leave, fearing President Bashar al-Assad’s advancing forces were about to impose a siege after cutting rebel supply lines north of the city.

But this week, some of those who fled Aleppo, which has seen some of the Syrian war’s worst bombing and house-to-house fighting, have returned.

Aleppo resident Jamila al-Shabani said she had been out seeing parts of the city she had not visited in a long time because of what she described as her “self-imposed confinement” at home. “People were afraid to go out,” she said.

“The park yesterday was a beehive where children and families flocked,” added Abdullah Aslan, another Aleppo resident contacted by Reuters. “It was lovely and sunny. The park was full, people now when they go out with their families feel safer,” he said.

Before the war, tourists enjoyed Aleppo, Syria’s second city and one of the oldest inhabited in the world. Architectural gems — bathhouses, palaces, churches and mosques — studded Aleppo’s streets, making it one of the richest historical sites in the Middle East. Souks that traced their history back four millennia sold spices, the city’s trademark laurel soap and the antique textiles that were coveted in Europe.

BUSTLING MARKET

Residents contacted by Reuters described bustling scenes in the market, some likening it to the last-minute rush before the start of a big religious holiday. “People are more assured,” said Abdul Munim Juneid, an orphanage supervisor.

On the other side of the city, which is under government control, residents have also noticed a drop in insurgent shelling. But like Syrians in rebel-held territory, residents remain cautious and fearful. “Now, to a small degree, it is different. But there is still fear that any moment they will shell peaceful neighborhoods,” said 28-year-old Suheib Masry.

Both rebel groups and the Syrian government say they are respecting the cessation of hostilities agreement, while accusing each other of violating it.

The pace of the war is virtually unchanged in some parts of northern Syria, notably on frontlines near the border with Turkey where rebels report attacks by government forces seeking to seal the frontier.

The government is saying little about military operations in those areas, where rebel forces viewed as moderate by the West fight in close proximity to jihadists who are not included in the cessation of hostilities agreement.

While the government says it is cooperating with international efforts, the opposition is voicing deep misgivings. It says aid deliveries are reaching a fraction of those in need and that Assad is pressing his war effort in violation of the agreement.

Army helicopters have dropped leaflets calling on rebels to lay down their arms and vowing to fight those who resist.

“CALM BEFORE THE STORM”

Residents in the town of Jisr al-Shughour, captured by rebels from government forces last year, fear it is only a matter of time before the next offensive begins. They say there has been no let up in government shelling there.

“There is a lot of fear. There is paralysis with no buying or selling and those who have assets are trying to get rid of them,” said Abdullah Akhras, talking from a village near the town. “It’s the calm before the storm. This truce is nothing more than a preparation for a huge battle. They (the government) are now amassing forces to begin on every front.”

Still, in opposition-held areas near Damascus people are using the relative calm to see to long-neglected tasks such as repairing damaged homes and even tending to gardens.

“We now see the kids in the neighborhood going and coming and playing,” said Badran al Doumi, owner of a furniture store in the city of Douma to the east of Damascus.

The noise of vehicles has replaced the sound of warplanes that so frequently bomb the area, residents say.

Instead of carrying reports on casualty tolls from government attacks, the social media feed of a civil defense service operating in the area showed rescue workers repairing vehicles, cleaning mosques, and hosting a children’s party.

Just 5 miles away across the frontlines in government-controlled areas of Damascus, 60-year-old Samira al-Shawki hoped the calm would last. “The sounds of blasts are fewer to a degree, but we want it to stay this way,” she said.

(Additional reporting by Kinda Makieh in Damascus and Tom Perry in Beirut; Editing by Tom Perry and Peter Millership)

U.S. says working with Russia on aid flow, truce in Syria

By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA (Reuters) – The United States is working with Russia to improve access to besieged areas in Syria and to stop the Syrian government from removing medical supplies from aid convoys, a senior U.S. official said on Wednesday.

Antony Blinken, deputy U.S. Secretary of State, said that major and regional powers were monitoring a fragile cessation of hostilities that went into force on Saturday to “prevent any escalation” but it was a “challenging process”.

“At the end of the day the best possible thing that could happen is for the cessation of hostilities to really take root, and to be sustained, for the humanitarian assistance to flow and then for the negotiations to start that lead to a political transition,” Blinken told a news conference.

The World Health Organisation said Syrian officials had “rejected” medical supplies from being part of the latest convoy to the besieged town of Moadamiya on Monday. WHO spokesman Tarik Jasarevic said they included emergency kits, trauma and burn kits and antibiotics.

“We are indeed very concerned about reports that medical supplies were removed from some of the aid convoys. This is an issue that was brought before the task force,” Blinken said, referring to the International Syria Support Group (ISSG).

“We are now working, including with Russia, to ensure that going forward medical supplies remain in the aid convoys as they deliver assistance.”

Russian officials were not immediately available to comment.

“The removal of those supplies is yet another unconscionable act by the regime, but this is now before the task force and we will look in the days ahead as assistance continues to flow to make sure that those medical supplies are in fact included,” Blinken said.

The humanitarian task force, chaired by Jan Egeland, meets again in Geneva on Thursday.

Another ISSG task force on the cessation of hostilities is handling reports of violations of the truce, which does not include Islamic State or the al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front.

“We’re then able to immediately try to address them and to prevent them from reoccurring and thus to prevent any escalation that leads to the breakdown of the cessation of hostilities,” Blinken said, after talks with U.N. Special Envoy Staffan de Mistura.

“That’s the most effective way to try to keep it going and then to deepen it. But it is a very challenging process, it’s fragile and we have our eyes wide open about those challenges.”

(Reporting by Stephanie Nebehay; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

18 killed in car bomb against Syrian insurgents in southern province Quneitra: monitor

BEIRUT (Reuters) – Eighteen fighters were killed in a car bomb blast that hit a Syrian insurgent group in the southern province of Quneitra on Wednesday, a monitoring group reported, and a rebel source said the attack was likely carried out by hardline Islamists.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the explosion took place in the village of al-Isha, hitting a base belonging to Jabhat Thuwwar Souria, a Free Syrian Army group.

Suhaib al-Ruhail, a spokesman for the Alwiyat al-Furqan group which operates in the area, said it was most likely carried out by “Daesh sleeper cells”, a reference to Islamic State.

The incident did not appear to be related to the current cessation of hostilities between the Syrian government and its allies and non-jihadist insurgent groups.

(Reporting by John Davison in Beirut and Suleiman Al-Khalidi in Amman; Editing by Hugh Lawson)

Report shows ISIS bomb supply chain stretches to 20 countries

The Islamic State is building and deploying improvised explosive devices on a “quasi-industrial scale” across Iraq and Syria, according to a new report that examines the group’s supply chain.

The organization has utilized bomb components that were manufactured in 20 countries across four continents, Conflict Armament Research said last week in a report on its 20-month study.

The bombs have become the organization’s “signature weapon,” according to the report, in large part because they can be built out of inexpensive components that can easily be purchased.

The report notes many IED parts are commercial goods like fertilizer, cell phones and other electronic elements, the sale of which aren’t as tightly scrutinized and regulated as firearms. That has allowed more than 700 items connected to Brazil, China, Switzerland, Japan, the United States and 15 other nations to end up in the Islamic State’s improvised explosive devices.

The study indicated 13 Turkish companies were connected to the supply chain, the most of any nation. India followed with seven companies and the United Arab Emirates was third with six.

The report does not accuse any of the 20 countries, or the 51 companies, of directly supplying the material to the Islamic State. It notes that all of the products were lawfully obtained by trade and distribution companies, who subsequently sold them to smaller commercial outlets.

Many of those smaller entities “appear to have sold, whether wittingly or unwittingly” the items to people in some way associated with the Islamic State, the report states, adding that those smaller sellers “appear to be the weakest link in the chain of custody.”

Conflict Armament Research found the Islamic State was able to obtain some products shortly after they were legally given to commercial entities, suggesting some issues with the process.

“The appearance of these components in possession of IS forces, as little as one month following their lawful supply to commercial entities in the region, speaks to a lack of monitoring by national governments and companies alike,” the report states. “It may also indicate a lack of awareness surrounding the potential use of these civilian-market components by terrorist and insurgent forces.”

Islamic State terrorist attacks killed 6,073 people in Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Lebanon and Turkey in 2014, according to the most recent edition of the Global Terrorism Index.

The organization was also linked to another 20,000 deaths on various battlefields, the index found, but it did not indicate how many of the 26,000-plus deaths were specifically from IEDs.

U.N. to restart Syria peace talks on March 9

GENEVA (Reuters) – The United Nations will delay the next round of Syria peace talks by two days to allow the cessation of hostilities in force since Saturday to take hold, U.N. Syria envoy Staffan de Mistura said.

International observers have acknowledged violations of the agreement intended to halt nearly five years of fighting while reporting that the level of violence has decreased considerably.

“We are delaying it to the afternoon of (March) 9th for logistical and technical reasons and also for the ceasefire to better settle down,” de Mistura told Reuters on Tuesday. The talks had been penciled in for March 7.

The cessation of hostilities was “a glimmer of hope”, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said, although he accused the opposition of violating the agreement.

The opposition in turn says the Syrian government has breached the fragile truce by repeatedly attacking its positions, which the government denies.

“We will play our part to make the whole thing work,” Assad told Germany’s ARD television network, adding that the Syrian army had not reacted to truce violations in order to give the agreement a chance.

“The terrorists have breached the deal from the first day. We as the Syrian army are refraining from responding in order to give a chance to sustain the agreement. But in the end there are limits and it all depends on the other side,” Assad said.

The cessation of hostilities agreement, drawn up by the United States and Russia, is seen by the U.N. as an opportunity to revive peace talks which collapsed before they had even started a month ago in Geneva.

It also hopes the truce will allow humanitarian aid to be sent into besieged areas where manySyrians are living in dire conditions.

However, the opposition said it had yet to be officially informed of a new round of talks on March 9, insisting that no serious discussions can begin before detainees are freed and blockades are lifted.

Riad Nassan Agha, a member of the High Negotiations Committee, told Reuters the opposition would study the call for talks based on developments on the ground, adding that it heard of the March 9 date only through the media.

NEGOTIATING TABLE

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said there was an urgent need to implement the agreement and for the warring parties to return to the negotiating table, a U.N. statement said.

“They agreed on the importance of urgently moving forward simultaneously on implementing the cessation of hostilities agreement, providing vital humanitarian assistance to civilians, and returning to political negotiations,” the statement said.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Monday that while efforts were being made to track down alleged violations of the cessation of hostilities, there was currently no evidence to suggest they would destabilize the fragile peace.

In a telephone conversation on Tuesday, Lavrov and Kerry reaffirmed the importance of coordination, chiefly military, between Moscow and Washington to strengthen the truce, the Russian foreign ministry reported.

De Mistura expected to see attempts to disrupt the ceasefire, saying these needed to be contained to avoid them spreading and undermining the credibility of the truce.

“We don’t want discussions in Geneva to become a discussion about infringements or not of the ceasefire, we want them to actually address the core of everything,” he said in an interview.

De Mistura wants the Syrian sides to focus on constitutional reform, governance, and hopes elections can be held in 18 months. Prisoner releases would also be “very much up front on the agenda”, he said.

Syria‘s Ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva, Hussam Aala, said his government was cooperating over aid deliveries, including to rebel-led areas. It was facilitating “access to humanitarian aid to those who need it without discrimination, between the besieged zones or zones infiltrated by terrorists”.

However, addressing the U.N. Human Rights Council, he also accused Saudi Arabia and Qatar of financing jihadist rebel groups including the Nusra Front, which is linked to al Qaeda, and also rejected criticism from France.

JIHADIST GROUPS

The agreement does not include Islamic State or the Nusra Front, and Assad and his Russian backers have made clear they intend to keep attacking them.

The Saudi-backed “moderate” opposition says that because some of their fighters are in areas alongside Nusra, they fear being targeted too.

The Russian Defence Ministry said it was refraining from striking areas where the “moderate opposition” was respecting the ceasefire agreement, Interfax news agency reported.

A total of 15 ceasefire violations have been registered in Syria in the past 24 hours, Interfax quoted the Russian military as saying. The U.S. State Department, however, said it had not received any reports of “significant” violations.

The Syrian military denied it was responsible for any violations and said “terrorist groups”, the term it uses to describe its enemies, were to blame. Operations against Islamic State – also known as Daesh – and the Nusra Front were going ahead.

“The combat operations that the Syrian Arab Army is carrying out against Daesh and Nusra are continuing according to the plans of the military command,” a Syrian military source said.

(Additional reporting by Lidia Kelly and Tom Perry; Writing by Giles Elgood; Editing by Peter Millership, Pravin Char and David Stamp)

Russia calls for pact against chemical warfare by Islamic State

GENEVA (Reuters) – Russia said on Tuesday there was a growing threat from Islamic State militants waging chemical warfare in the Middle East and called for global negotiations on a new pact to combat what he called “a grave reality of our time”.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov made the appeal in a speech to the U.N.-sponsored Conference on Disarmament in Geneva, a now largely moribund forum which clinched a major pact banning chemical weapons in the 1990s.

“However, we still face significant gaps related, in particular, to the use of chemicals for terrorist purposes,” Lavrov told the 65-member-state forum.

“This threat is getting extremely urgent in the light of newly revealed facts of repeated use of not only industrial toxic chemicals but also of full-fledged chemical warfare agents by ISIL (Islamic State) and other terrorist groups in Syria and Iraq,” he said.

Islamic State militants are believed to be responsible for sulfur mustard gas attacks in Syria and Iraq last year, the United States said last month.

A confidential report by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) concluded that at least two people were exposed to sulfur mustard in Marea, north of Aleppo, in August.

“It does not leave any doubt that chemical terrorism is emerging not as an abstract threat, but a grave reality of our time which could and should be addressed,” Lavrov said.

“There is a growing danger of similar crimes being committed on the territory of Libya and Yemen,” he said.

Lavrov said there were reports of militant groups gaining access to scientific and technical documentation on the production of chemical weapons, seizing chemical plants and “engaging foreign specialists to help synthesize chemical warfare agents”, without giving details.

He said launching negotiations would revive the Conference on Disarmament, whose members include U.N. Security Council permanent members Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States, but which has not been able to clinch any disarmament agreements since “the last decade of the 20th Century”.

(Reporting by Stephanie Nebehay; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

Coalition discussed Syria ground incursion, Saudi official says

ANKARA/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Defense ministers from the U.S.-led coalition against the Islamic State militant group discussed the possibility of a Syrian ground incursion two weeks ago but they have not made a decision, an aide to Saudi Arabia’s defense minister said on Monday.

“It was discussed two weeks ago in Brussels,” Brigadier General Ahmed Asseri said in a telephone interview from Riyadh. “It was discussed at the political level but it wasn’t discussed as a military mission,” he said.

“Once this is organized, and decided how many troops and how they will go and where they will go, we will participate in that,” he said. “We need to discuss at the military level very extensively with the military experts to make sure that we have a plan.”

Asseri also said the kingdom was now ready to strike Islamic State from Turkey’s southern Incirlik air base, where four Saudi fighter jets arrived last week. The jets have not yet participated in any attacks, he added.

The U.S. State Department said the Saudis had previously talked about the possibility of introducing ground forces in Syria to fight Islamic State, but there were many issues that needed to be discussed about a potential incursion.

Deploying ground forces would be a major escalation for the 66-member U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State, which has so far relied mainly on air strikes and arming and equipping moderate Syrian opposition groups.

State Department spokesman John Kirby said at a news briefing in Washington that the Saudis had talked about “the potential of an introduction of some sort of ground force element in Syria” and that the United States would welcome such a contribution in the fight against Islamic State.

“But there’s a lot that needs to be discussed in terms of what they would do, what their makeup would be, how they would need to be supported by the coalition going forward. So there’s a lot of homework that needs to be done,” Kirby said.

A U.S. defense official said supporting indigenous anti-Islamic State forces on the ground was a key component of the U.S. strategy against the group.

“We will continue to provide equipment packages to vetted leaders and their units so that over time they can make a concerted push into territory still controlled” by Islamic State, the official said.

“As a matter of policy, we won’t comment or speculate on potential future operations,” the official added.

(Writing by Humeyra Pamuk and Mohammad Zargham; Editing by David Dolan and Lisa Shumaker)

Syrian opposition says government is wrecking truce deal

BEIRUT/GENEVA (Reuters) – A senior official from Syria’s main opposition group said on Monday that a fragile international attempt to halt nearly five years of fighting was in danger of total collapse because of attacks by government forces.

The cessation of hostilities drawn up by Washington and Moscow faced “complete nullification” because Syrian government attacks were violating the agreement, the official of the Saudi-backed opposition High Negotiations Committee (HNC) said.

France said there were reports of attacks on opposition forces in breach of the deal, which came into force on Saturday, and countries backing the Syrian peace process met to try to clarify the situation.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said the pause in the fighting was largely holding, despite some incidents that he hoped would be contained. The Kremlin said the process was under way, although it had always been clear it would not be easy.

In Washington, the White House said the United States remained committed to implementing the cessation of hostilities despite reports of violations over the weekend.

The cessation deal does not include jihadist groups such as Islamic State and the al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front, however, and Russia, which is backing the Syrian government with air power, has made clear it intends to keep bombing these groups.

An aide to Saudi Arabia’s defense minister said on Monday, meanwhile, that defense ministers from the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State had discussed the possibility of a Syrian ground incursion two weeks ago in Brussels.

“It was discussed at the political level but it wasn’t discussed as a military mission,” Saudi Brigadier General Ahmed Asseri told Reuters. “Once this is organized, and decided how many troops and how they will go and where they will go, we will participate in that.”

The cessation of hostilities agreement, the first of its kind since the Syrian civil war began in 2011, is a less formal arrangement than a ceasefire. It is meant to allow peace talks to resume and aid to reach besieged communities.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said it was largely holding with casualties greatly reduced compared with before the agreement took effect.

Syrian forces made some gains, however. The Observatory reported they had taken territory near Damascus on Monday after a battle with the Nusra Front and other Islamist rebels.

Syrian government forces also regained control of a road to the northern city of Aleppo after making advances against Islamic State fighters.

Aid trucks carrying non-food items such as blankets on Monday entered Mouadamiya, a suburb of Damascus under siege by government forces, the Syrian Arab Red Crescent said.

The United Nations and other agencies hope to deliver aid to more than 150,000 people in besieged areas over the next five days.

GLOOMY ASSESSMENT

Asaad al-Zoubi, head of the HNC’s delegation to the peace talks, gave a gloomy assessment of the truce. “We are not facing a violation of the truce … we are facing a complete nullification,” he said on Al Arabiya al Hadath TV.

“I believe the international community has totally failed in all its experiments, and must take real, practical measures toward the (Syrian) regime,” Zoubi said, without elaborating.

He said there were no signs of any preparations for peace talks, which the U.N. wants to reconvene on March 7.

Talks in Geneva in early February collapsed before they started, with rebels saying they could not negotiate while they were being bombed.

HNC spokesman Salim al-Muslat said the truce was a step in the right direction, but a mechanism was needed to stop such violations and encourage negotiations.

“There has to be a power that really stops what Russia and what the regime is doing,” Muslat said in a television interview with Reuters in Riyadh. “Today there [were] about 10 Russian air strikes, about 16 air strikes done by the regime.”

Syrian officials could not immediately be reached for comment on claims that government forces were violating the cessation. The government has said it is abiding by the agreement.

However, a Syrian foreign ministry official accused Saudi Arabia of trying to undermine the cessation of hostilities agreement by saying there would be a “Plan B” if it failed. He did not give details of the plan, which is believed to include military action.

Russia on Monday also rejected any suggestion of a Plan B, which has been alluded to by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry.

Countries belonging to the “International Syria Support Group” (ISSG), led by the United States and Russia, met in Geneva on Monday.

They are supposed to monitor compliance with the deal and act rapidly to end any flare-ups.

“We have received indications that attacks, including by air, have been continuing against zones controlled by the moderate opposition,” French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said in Geneva. “All this needs to be verified.”

AIR STRIKES ARE HEAVY

The HNC said the cessation of hostilities was broken by the Syrian government 15 times on the first day, and that there were further violations by Russia and Hezbollah, both allies of President Bashar al-Assad.

On the ground, rebels said the violence was below pre-ceasefire levels in some places and little changed in others.

Colonel Fares al-Bayoush, head of a Free Syrian Army group called the Northern Division, told Reuters: “The air strikes are heavy today, especially by Russian planes.”

Abu al-Baraa al-Hamawi, a fighter with the Ajnad al-Sham group in northwestern Syria, said the government had shelled a number of villages. “It is regular bombardment, no change. The regime after the truce is as it was before.”

A fighter in the Aleppo area said the overall level of violence had gone down, but there were many violations and people were pessimistic.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which monitors the war through a network of contacts on the ground, said the number of people dying each day had gone down substantially since the cessation started.

“Yesterday, around 20 people died, both fighters and civilians. Before, there was an average of maybe around 180 people a day. It’s a big reduction in terms of human losses,” Observatory director Rami Abdulrahman said.

(Additional reporting by John Davison, Mariam Karouny, Tom Perry, Lisa Barrington, Ali Abdelatti, Stephanie Nebehay, Ayesha Rascoe, Susan Heavey and Ece Toksabay; Writing by Giles Elgood; Editing by Peter Millership, David Stamp and Pravin Char)

U.N. demands Syria parties halt fighting, peace talks set for March 7

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – The United Nations Security Council on Friday unanimously demanded that all parties to the civil war in Syria comply with the terms of a U.S.-Russian deal on a “cessation of hostilities” due to take effect at midnight local time.

The demand was included in a resolution drafted jointly by Russia and the United States that also urged the government and opposition to resume U.N.-brokered peace talks.

Before the 15-nation council voted, U.N. Syria mediator Staffan de Mistura told its members via video link from Geneva that he intends to reconvene peace talks on March 7 provided the halt in fighting largely holds and allows for greater delivery of humanitarian relief.

The council demanded “that all parties to whom the cessation of hostilities applies … fulfill their commitments.”

It also urged “all Member States, especially ISSG (International Syria Support Group) members, to use their influence with the parties to the cessation of hostilities to ensure fulfillment of those commitments and to support efforts to create conditions for a durable and lasting ceasefire.”

De Mistura had abruptly aborted a first round of talks on Feb. 3 and urged countries in the International Syria Support Group (ISSG), led by the United States and Russia, to do more preparatory work.

“It is going to be extremely challenging, especially at the outset, to make this work,” U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power told the council. “Even a partial de-escalation would make a real difference in the lives of Syrians.”

She added that any violations of the cessation of hostilities must be met with a “sober, coordinated response.”

Russian Deputy Foreign Ministry Gennady Gatilov told the council that “we now have a real chance to end violence and to step up our collective combat against terrorism.” He added that it would also be an opportunity to boost humanitarian aid relief.

The council meeting was delayed by half an hour as the United States and Russia engaged in last-minute negotiations on the text, diplomats told Reuters.

Among the changes was the removal of two references to the Saudi-backed High Negotiations Committee (HNC), a Syrian opposition coalition that Russia and Iran do not consider to be a legitimate representative in the peace talks.

French Ambassador Francois Delattre was cautious.

“Resumption of (peace) discussions will only be possible if the agreed-upon commitments are strictly implemented by the regime and foreign powers that support it,” he said,

He said he was disturbed by the “intensification of bombings by the Syrian army and Russia, a few hours only before the start of the (halt).”

(Reporting by Michelle Nichols and Louis Charbonneau; Editing by Andrew Hay)

Officials investigating another suspected case of ISIS using chemical weapons

Officials are investigating if the Islamic State used chemical weapons in a recent attack in Iraq.

The Kurdistan Regional Security Council and officials from the United States-led coalition against the Islamic State are looking into Thursday’s events, the council tweeted on Friday.

According to the council, Islamic State militants used homemade rockets in an attack on the town of Sinjar, which is located about 80 miles west of Mosul in northern Iraq.

Dozens of civilians and Peshmerga military forces subsequently vomited, experienced nausea or had trouble breathing and received treatment, the council tweeted. It did not say if anyone died.

Officials did not specify which chemical the Islamic State is believed to have used in the attack.

If the investigation does confirm a chemical weapon was used, the council said it would be the eighth time that the Islamic State used the substances in their attacks against Peshmerga forces.

The council tweeted last March that it believed the Islamic State used chlorine in a car bomb attack in Iraq in January 2015, saying soil and clothing samples contained evidence of its use.

The council has also tweeted it has evidence the Islamic State used mustard gas in prior attacks, saying some 35 Peshmerga forces were exposed during an August 2015 shelling near Erbil, Iraq.

The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) has also said it was concerned about chlorine gas being used in various attacks in Syrian villages in 2014.

An OPCW fact-finding mission into the attacks in Syria did not address who used the chlorine.

More than 190 countries have agreed to a 1997 United Nations treaty on chemical weapons, which prohibits their use or production and calls for nations to destroy their existing arsenals.