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Russia, US, UN start consultations in Geneva to prepare peace conference on Syria

In the last six months this is the fifth round of consultations

© AP Photo/Fabrice Coffrini, Pool

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Russia's deputy foreign minister, Syrian opposition head talk on Syria conference

GENEVA, December 20. /ITAR-TASS/. Russian, U.S. and U.N. diplomats have met in Geneva to prepare the Geneva II Peace Conference due to take place on January 22, 2014.

Russia is represented by deputies foreign minister, Mikhail Bogdanov and Gennady Gatilov. The U.S. delegation is led by Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Wendy Sheman. The U.N. delegation is chaired by Special Envoy Lakhdar Brahimi.

In the last six months this is the fifth round of consultations. The latest talks were held on November 25. The parties agreed on the date and the place of the conference: it will be launched in the Swiss city of Montreux on January 22, 2014. However, the parties failed to settle disagreements on two moments - in what format the opposition will be represented and what countries should be invited. It is not ruled out that these issues will be raised at the current meeting.

Then the meeting should be joined by representatives of other member-states of the U.N. Security Council (in addition to Russia and the United States, these are Britain, China and France), delegations of four states neighbouring Syria (Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey and Iraq) that accepted and deployed more than 2.4 million Syrian refugees.

The United Nations Organisation believes that the year 2014 will be also grave for Syria in the humanitarian aspect. A total of 6.5 billion dollars out of 12.9 billion due to be provided to Syria for humanitarian operations are designed to be rendered to Syria. The number of Syrians, who need assistance, is estimated of 16 million people. The total population in Syria is of about 20 million.

Over 100,000 people have been killed in Syria since armed clashes between the government and rebels have begun in March 2011, the U.N. said.

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Lavrov confirms Geneva conference to be held January 22, 2014

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Middle East and North Africa Geneva II

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