Russian President's Special Envoy on Syria, Alexander Lavrentiev discussed Sunday with Syria's Head of regime Bashar al-Assad the results of the recent Istanbul summit on Syria which called for the formation of the constitutional committee. Lavrentiev is expected to arrive in Tehran today to discuss with officials the results of the summit as well.
Media office of the Syrian presidency announced that Assad met Lavrentiev and the accompanying delegation in Damascus, during which the Russian officials informed Assad of the development at the quartet summit that took place on October 27.
The presidency said in a statement that Assad discussed with the Russian envoy “forming the committee to discuss the current constitution.” They agreed "to continue joint Syrian-Russian work towards removing the obstacles still in the way of forming this committee", it said.
The Russian envoy also discussed with Assad efforts exerted by Moscow with regional and international parties to remove the obstacles to progress on finding a political solution for Syria.
Last week, an unprecedented quartet summit on Syria was held in Istanbul between Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Russian President Vladimir Putin, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel. The summit called for the committee to be formed by the end of the year to discuss a post-war constitution, “paving the way for free and fair elections” in the war-torn country.
The push for a political solution to end the Syrian conflict is evident from the invitation to form the constitutional committee, which resulted from the intra-Syrian dialogue in Sochi last January.
UN envoy to Syria, Staffan de Mistura, was tasked to form the committee to include 150 members and meet in Geneva.
Both the regime and the opposition submitted a list of 50 representatives, after de Mistura's efforts to submit a list of 50 names have failed, knowing that the Envoy is short time after he announced he would step down at the end of the month.
Following a meeting in Damascus with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moalem on October 24, de Mistura told the Security Council in a televised briefing that Moalem strongly underlined principles of sovereignty and “non-interference in internal affairs of UN member states.”
The Government had already declined the UN offers to engage it directly on the constitutional committee and its follow-up, added the Envoy, indicating that: “Minister Moalem stated that the Astana guarantors had rejected the initial UN proposal on a third list.”
Nine rounds of indirect talks sponsored by the United Nations have failed since 2016, as both Moscow and Ankara continue their efforts to end the war, although a political settlement is still far from being reached.
Deputy commander-in-chief of Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), Brigadier General Hossein Salami, indicated that Iranian forces have no plans to stay in Syria on the long run.
"The presence of Iran in Syria was at the request of the Syrian government, and we have no long-term plan to remain in this country," Salami was quoted by Iran's Fars news agency on Sunday.
He also stressed that there are no disagreements with Russian officials in Syria, and described media reports promoting that as fabrications.
Fars also quoted Russian Ambassador to Tehran Levan Dzhagaryan confirming that Putin’s Envoy will visit Tehran on Monday.
Lavrentyev plans to hold talks with Iran's Supreme National Security Council Secretary Ali Shamkhani on the latest developments in the crisis.
Lavrentyev visited Tehran last July and met with Assistant Secretary of the Iranian Supreme National Security Council for Foreign Policy and International Security Saeed Ayroani.
