UNITED NATIONS — The United States accused the Syrian government on Thursday of stalling political negotiations and called for a new route to U.N.-monitored elections and a nationwide cease-fire that would end the country’s eight-year conflict.
Acting U.S. Ambassador Jonathan Cohen called for Russia and Syria to de-escalate military operations in the last rebel-held strongholds in Idlib and northern Hama and warned that the United States will keep ratcheting up pressure if this doesn’t happen.
He told the Security Council it must acknowledge that efforts to advance the political process by the so-called Astana group — comprising Syrian government allies Russia and Iran and opposition supporter Turkey — “have failed.”
And after 17 months of negotiations to form a committee to draft a new Syrian constitution, Cohen said, “it is time to admit that not only has progress stalled, it is likely to remain out of reach for some time — because that’s where the regime wants it to be.”
Agreement on a new constitution has been seen as a key step toward implementing a 2012 roadmap for peace that includes a cease-fire and ends in U.N.-supervised elections. It was approved by representatives of the U.N., Arab League, European Union, Turkey, and all five veto-wielding Security Council members — the U.S., Russia, China, France and Britain — and endorsed by the Security Council.
Cohen said it’s time for U.N. special envoy Geir Pedersen, who has been trying to get the government and opposition to agree on a constitutional committee, to try other routes to a political settlement of the Syrian conflict by focusing on preparations for elections and a cease-fire.
He said the U.S. believes that the reinvigoration of the political process can and should start with a cease-fire in Idlib and northern Hama.
Cohen warned that “Idlib must not become another Aleppo,” and said Russia and its close ally Syrian President Bashar Assad, “must immediately cease military operations” and return to the lines of a 2018 cease-fire agreement reached in the Russian Black Sea resort of Sochi. He said “Turkey should be entrusted to remove terrorist forces from the region” consistent with the Sochi agreement.
The United States recognizes that “there is no path forward without the cooperation of Russia and the Assad regime,” Cohen said. “Therefore, the United States calls upon Russia to de-escalate its military operations, press the regime to do the same, and engage with the United States in a step-by-step process” to implement the Security Council resolution endorsing the 2012 roadmap.
He said “that will result in the final stabilization of Idlib and Syria writ large.”
But Cohen warned that until Syria and Russia take “concrete steps” to de-escalate the violence in Idlib, “the United States will continue to apply diplomatic and economic pressure through all available means to isolate the regime and its allies.”
He said the U.S. prefers working together a step-by-step approach but “will seek any and every opportunity to ratchet up our pressure on the regime and its supporters if political progress on humanitarian and political tracks continues to stall.”
