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Middle East and North Africa

United States remains committed to agreements with Russia to call an international peace conference for Syriа

John Kerry admitted that the Syrian crisis was unlikely to be solved by military means and that only a political solution was possible

Photo EPA/ITAR-TASS

Photo EPA/ITAR-TASS

UNITED NATIONS, July 25 (Itar-Tass) - U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said after meeting U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Thursday that Washington remained committed to the agreements with Russia to convene an international peace conference for Syria and that he had confirmed the U.S. stance in a recent telephone conversation with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

John Kerry admitted that the Syrian crisis was unlikely to be solved by military means and that only a political solution was possible. He believes that leadership is needed to persuade the people to sit down at the negotiating table.

For his part, Ban Ki-moon agreed that it was necessary to hold a peace conference for Syria as soon as possible. He also said that the death toll in the Syrian conflict had reached 100,000 people and that it was necessary to put an end to that loss of life. He called for stopping all military hostilities and violence in Syria.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry reached an agreement to hold a peace conference for Syria on May 7. Early in July, it was announced that progress had been made in the preparation for the Geneva-2 conference but it would be impossible to convene it earlier than September. The Syrian opposition’s unwillingness to participate in the conference remains the main hindrance for setting the exact date for the Geneva-2 forum.

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