20/08/2013 10:02
Plans for peace conference to be discussed in The Hague
A leading diplomat from the U.S. State Department and the U.S. ambassador to Syria will meet with a Russia delegation in The Hague next week to discuss plans for a peace conference to end the civil war in Syria, a spokeswoman for the State Department said on Monday, the Reuters reports.
The Russian delegation is likely to include deputy foreign ministers Gennady Gatilov and Mikhail Bogdanov, Russian Interfax news agency reported. It quoted Gatilov as saying that the sides hoped to make progress on who should attend the conference.
Iran's participation in the so-called Geneva-2 conference is a thorny issue for the United States, which has condoned the presence of Iranian advisers aiding President Bashar al-Assad in the two-year civil war.
A team of United Nations chemical weapons experts arrived in the capital Damascus on Sunday after months of delays to investigate reports about the possible use of chemical weapons in the Syrian civil war.