Syrian rebels, U.S. disagree on peace talks

Stephen Starr | Special for USA TODAY

ISTANBUL — The Syrian opposition said Wednesday it welcomes the promise of increased U.S. involvement in finding a solution to two years of war, but that it would not accept peace talks if top members of the regime of Bashar Assad are involved.

The stand of the country's leading opposition group, the Syrian National Coalition, is in direct conflict with the peace talks that the Obama administration are seeking to help organize next month in Geneva.

Secretary of State John Kerry urged the Syrian government Wednesday to attend the proposed peace talks that would also include Russia, a chief patron of Syria that has refused to support rebel demands that Assad be forced out in return for peace.

"We hope the U.S. will lead the international role to solving the conflict," said Khaled Saleh, spokesman for the Syria National Coalition. "The coalition welcomes any solution as long as it meets the democratic aspirations of the Syrian people but it must start with the departure of Assad."

Saleh repeated that the rebellion needs the United States and other Western nations to impose a no-fly zone over Syria to stop Assad's warplanes as well as strategic military strikes on government positions. Kerry on Wednesday threatened to give non-lethal aid, such as medical kits and food, to the rebels if Assad did not join talks.

The back-and-forth seems to indicate that Kerry's endeavor on behalf of President Obama will satisfy none of the principals involved in the conflict. Kerry met with Arab leaders in Jordan on Wednesday to win backers for the peace talks.

The finer details of the proposed Geneva talks have yet to be ironed out while the presence of Iran, a chief ally of the Assad regime, has not been ruled out. Speaking in Cairo, Lakhdar Brahimi, the United Nations-Arab League mediator, said that both the opposition and regime are preparing to take part in the conference.

Diplomacy has so far failed to stop the violence in a conflict the United Nations says has cost the lives of more than 80,000 people and forced more than 1 million to flee Syria's borders. SNC members will gather in Istanbul on Thursday for a three-day meeting to elect a president and decide if it will attend the Geneva conference.

Speaking with USA TODAY last week, interim SNC President George Sabra said he held little hope for the joint U.S.-Russian diplomatic effort and would not commit to attending talks before seeing who would be invited from the regime's side. Russia has made statements that Assad's regime was overreaching in its attempts to stay intact, but it has not said it would seek to force the leader out.

"Assad is threatening the entire region as we've seen in Turkey and Lebanon recently and I think Russia is starting to recognize it is making a mistake," Saleh said. The (Geneva) conference is an example of that."

Analysts said the call for talks represents a change in U.S. policy by not insisting that Assad agree to vacate his position immediately.

"The goal of the U.S. is to help bring about a solution by bringing the regime and the opposition together," said Fawaz Gerges, director of the Middle East Center at the London School of Economics. "This is a major shift — the U.S. no longer insisting on Assad's departure as a precondition to talks."

"It's important because what John Kerry is trying to do now is to convince America's regional allies and the allies of the opposition, in particular Turkey and Qatar, to at least convene in Geneva and to convince the political opposition to take it seriously and form a negotiating team to go to Geneva," he said. "The U.S. is acting now because it's afraid that war could expand into regional war."