Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has raised prospects of revival of a truce in Syria, saying he hopes a cease-fire covering the city of Aleppo would be announced “in the nearest future, even in the coming hours.”
He says the United States and Russia aim to create a center for rapid response to cease-fire violations in Syria.
At a news conference following a meeting Tuesday with U.N. Syria envoy Staffan de Mistura, Lavrov said the center would be located in Geneva and is expected to start operating within a few days.
The United Nations mediator on Syria said moribund peace talks on the conflict could soon be resumed if a faltering truce were extended to the city of Aleppo, something the Russian foreign minister said he hoped would be announced within hours.
Staffan de Mistura, the U.N. envoy, made his upbeat comments on Tuesday after holding talks with Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, in Moscow.
 

The Italian-Swedish diplomat said he thought there was a chance to relaunch a cessation of hostilities, which lies in tatters after fierce clashes in Aleppo, by reinforcing and extending local truces.
“I have a feeling and a hope that we can relaunch this,” de Mistura told a news conference after the talks, referring to the partial truce which was originally brokered by Russia and the United States around two months ago.
“We all hope that … in a few hours we can relaunch the cessation of hostilities. If we can do this, we will be back on the right track.” His words were translated from English into Russian at the news conference.
The United States and Russia jointly sponsored a ceasefire which has been in place since February and allowed the first peace talks attended by the warring parties to take place.
But those talks broke up last month and the ceasefire has since largely unraveled. Moscow and Washington have been working to try to revive the original cessation of hostilities by getting new local truces agreed on the ground for short, defined periods at particular locations.
Such truces were agreed in two areas last week, but not in Aleppo, the divided northern city where a sharp escalation of violence has done the most to derail the shaky peace process.
Lavrov said Russia and the United States wanted to make such local truces open-ended and suggested a deal covering Aleppo was close at hand.
“The process of agreeing a ceasefire in Aleppo is being finished right now between Russian and American military personnel,” said Lavrov.
A joint U.S.-Russian ceasefire monitoring system staffed by officers from both countries was also being set up in Geneva, he added, and would help better track events on the ground.
“May is going to be an important month for Syria,” said de Mistura. “If, as we all hope, there will be definite confirmation that even Aleppo will return to a ceasefire regime, we can imagine that we can restart (peace) talks at the same time.”
De Mistura’s optimism was at odds with the situation on the ground .
In rebel-held parts of Aleppo there had been three air strikes and unconfirmed number of people killed., the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Tuesday.
The Observatory said 279 civilians have been killed in Aleppo by bombardments since April 22.

Source: Reuters, AP, 3 May 2016