Boost for talks backed by Russia and Turkey as opposition groups consent to send delegation to press for ceasefire

The Syrian opposition says it will attend peace talks sponsored by Turkey and Russia in Kazakhstan next week, in a key step in the latest attempt to end the six-year civil war in Syria.

It is set to decide the makeup of its delegation on Monday. The negotiations in Astana will bring together representatives of the opposition and the regime of Bashar al-Assad, as well Russia, Turkey and Iran. Donald Trump’s incoming administration has also been invited.

The talks, which are expected to begin on 23 January, come weeks into a ceasefire negotiated by Ankara and Moscow that has largely held across the country. The opposition’s High Negotiations Committee said it would back the talks, and Mohammed Alloush, its lead negotiator, confirmed that a delegation would be attending.

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“All the rebel groups are going to Astana. Everyone has agreed,” said Alloush, a leading figure in the Jaish al-Islam rebel group, in an interview with AFP. “Astana is a process to end the bloodletting by the regime and its allies. We want to end this series of crimes.”

A senior Turkish official said the opposition was committed to the talks. “As we get ready for the Astana talks, we are trying our best to make sure that the ceasefire holds, and so we’re talking to the Russians to keep the regime in check, because most of the violations so far have been made by the regime in certain parts of Syria,” said İbrahim Kalın, a spokesman for the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. “But we are also talking to the opposition to remain committed to the Astana process, and they’ve been very helpful and cooperative so far.”

The talks are the first serious effort in months to put a stop to the carnage in Syria, which has killed nearly half a million people, displaced half its population and left much of the country in ruins.

Russia, whose intervention was crucial in rescuing the Assad regime and turning the tide of the war in its favour, and Turkey, a stalwart backer of the opposition, normalised their relations last summer. That rapprochement bore fruit in December when the two nations brokered a ceasefire in the city of Aleppo, allowing the evacuation of tens of thousands of civilians who were besieged in a shrinking patch of rebel-held territory.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Mohammed Alloush. Photograph: Denis Balibouse/Reuters

Now both are pushing the peace talks, with Moscow working to anchor its position as a global superpower and limit the costs of its intervention in the war, and Ankara hoping to stem an influx of refugees, 2 million of whom have fled to Turkey.

The opposition’s participation is a boost to the talks, but key issues remain that could derail them, including disagreements over the future of Assad, the shape of a transitional government, and rivalries within both camps – particularly the competing interests of Russia and the other key backer of the Syrian regime, Iran.

Although the talks are being launched without any preconditions, the rebels are keen to demand that Assad is ousted, and that a transitional government is appointed, a key sticking point that Assad’s representatives will not agree to without significant pressure. The regime has been emboldened by recent battlefield victories that have left the opposition without any major urban centres under its control.

“Our position on Assad is clear,” said Kalin. “We don’t believe that a united, peaceful Syria will be possible with Assad remaining in power. But as I said, we will see how Astana talks go. We want to go step by step at this point.”

Osama Abu Zeid, an opposition negotiator and a legal adviser to the Free Syrian Army, told the Guardian the talks in Astana had a limited aim – to ensure that the ceasefire continues.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Osama Abu Zaid, a spokesman for the Free Syrian Army rebel alliance. Photograph: Umit Bektas/Reuters

“The participation in Astana is supported by all the factions and the High Negotiations Committee, and we want through it to reaffirm the ceasefire,” he said. “We decided to go to Astana primarily to reaffirm the ceasefire after the Russians promised to look into practical ways to enforce it.”

He added: “There won’t be political negotiations, so we have created a military delegation [for the Astana talks].”

Abu Zeid said the first round of talks would be short and will help determine whether the Russians were serious about putting a halt to all the fighting in the country, particularly in areas besieged by the Assad regime. If the first round succeeds, the opposition was prepared to proceed to a second round of discussions, he said.

Some rebel groups have refused to attend the talks, saying they do not believe the Russians are honest brokers.

“We have decided not to attend these negotiations because we still doubt the seriousness of the Russians and their ability to instil an atmosphere conducive to a political solution,” said Bassam Mustafa, a member of the political office of Noureddine al-Zinki, a rebel group influential in Aleppo and its countryside, who cited numerous ceasefire violations by the regime and its allied militias.

Still, sources with knowledge of the negotiations have said they could not have succeeded without Moscow’s dogged insistence in the face of objections by Tehran, which appears to be less willing to compromise on Assad’s fate.

A source with knowledge of the Aleppo negotiations in December said the Russians often worked around the clock to ensure their success, and made sure that fighters leaving the city in private cars during the evacuation were not hindered. Their intervention prevented a final assault by the regime and its militias on the rebel enclave, the source added.

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Meanwhile, the Iranians raised additional issues to derail the evacuation, presenting what one rebel official at the time described as a “Christmas list” of demands that included the full evacuation of two Shia villages besieged by fighters linked to al-Qaida.

“This perennial ambiguity of the Iranians always pops up in these talks and negotiations,” said one official. “The Russians I think are more pragmatic when it comes to the future of Assad. Iranians seem to have a more ideological commitment to him staying.”

Tehran has deployed thousands of Shia militia fighters from Iran, Iraq and Lebanon in an effort to shore up the regime and to maintain a supply route through the country and into neighboring Lebanon, where Iran’s proxy Hezbollah holds sway. Much of the rhetoric of the militias’ leaders in publicly available recordings has sectarian undertones, and the Islamic Republic is seeking to cement its influence in a regional tussle with its Sunni rivals, Saudi Arabia and its allies.

The Iranians have also been accused of abetting demographic change in Syria, reportedly clearing areas reclaimed by the regime from their Sunni inhabitants and settling Shia residents there instead.