Russian foreign minister says latest contacts with US over Syria were fruitless

MOSCOW, December 14. /TASS/. The latest talks with the United States over Syria were fruitless, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at a meeting with participants in the educational program Dialog for the Future, being run by the Gorchakov public diplomacy support fund.

"I believe that this channel of communication (with Turkey - TASS) may become more effective than many months of our fruitless get-togethers with the United States," he said. "Contacts remain but each time we agree on something the United States eventually pulls back away from the already concluded agreements. That was the case in September and in early December."

"We are being lectured on, we are being asked to agree corridors to let the militants out, but first of all we must stop any combat operations before such corridors can be created several days after," Lavrov said. "But before arguing, before trying to dictate pauses to us, which were invariably used to reinforce the militants, the Americans could have agreed long ago to spend just three days to create these corridors and remove the militants from eastern Aleppo."

The sole explanation for such actions by the United States is "the intention to let Jabhat al-Nusra (terrorist organization outlawed in Russia) escape by hook or by crook."

"But the militants are already leaving Aleppo. Many have realized that it is useless to stay there," Lavrov said. "The civilian population is moving out from there, too. Nobody drives out anybody. Only those who wish to leave do so."

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu have called for ending violence in Syria, including Aleppo, and underscored the importance of ensuring the local civilians’ safety. The Russian Foreign Ministry made a statement to that effect after a telephone conversation between the two foreign ministers held at Ankara’s initiative on Tuesday.