“The policies followed by the current US administration in the region are likely to have serious dangers for Syria and the whole region,” said Mohammad Javad Zarif, Iranian Minister of Foreign Affairs on Tuesday.
The Iranian top diplomat made the remarks upon arriving in Ankara where he is slated to meet with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov and Turkish FM Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu. The trilateral ministerial meeting is to prepare the agenda of the trilateral summit between the presidents of the three countries. The trilateral summit of Ankara is the second trilateral meeting of Rouhani, Putin, and Erdogan on Syrian crisis. The first round was held in Sochi.
“The most important meeting between Syrian fighting groups was the Sochi summit and it was an important move,” reiterated the Iranian diplomatic chief in response to questions posed by the media representatives at the airport.
“We have managed to curb the tensions in Syria following the Astana Peace Process in the past years but it was necessary to change the trend of events to a political process to follow this case with more precision and wisdom as it has consumed a big deal of toil so far,” added the Iranian foreign minister.
“The trilateral summit of tomorrow is in line with the Astana Peace Process to follow up the Syrian crisis and find ways to alleviate tensions,” he asserted.
“Of course, three have happened a host of developments in Syria in the time between the two summits and one of them is that the terrorists’ roles have decreased,” said Mr. Zarif.
“In the time between, very important parts of Syria have been freed from terrorists, especially near the capital and it is important that it was done with the least of casualties and loss of lives,” noted the Iranian foreign minister.
“The negative development in the period after the Sochi Summit is the way US is acting in the region trying to wedge ethnic gaps,” said the Iranian FM.
Russia, Turkey, and Iran are all deeply concerned about the war in Syria and sponsor a series of peace talks in the Kazakh capital, Astana.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu held a telephone conversation on March 30 to discuss the Putin-Erdogan meeting, the Russian foreign ministry announced in a statement.
“The ministers discussed a number of pressing bilateral issues in light of the upcoming Russian-Turkish summit,” the statement added.
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