Priority must be to end Syria bloodshed: Lavrov

Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Wednesday the priority in war-torn Syria must be to end the bloodshed rather than form an opposition bloc, following talks with his Arab counterparts in the Gulf.

“It is essential that an end to bloodshed in Syria is reached,” Lavrov told a news conference in Riyadh, adding that a plan to end the violence drafted at the Geneva meeting in June held the key.

“Russia is convinced that the priority is to end the bloodshed. This is what is stipulated by the Geneva plan,” he said, according to Arabic translation of his comments.

“We believe it is important, before anything else, that all external parties should work to implement the Geneva plan. No one is doing so,” he said.

The Moscow-backed Geneva plan called for all sides in Syria to implement a ceasefire, in line with a proposal by the former UN envoy on the crisis, Kofi Annan, and then to form a transitional government and review the constitution.

But it triggered new disputes between world powers, with the United States and its European allies ruling out any future role for President Bashar al-Assad but Russia saying the transitional government should be decided by Syrians alone.

“We suggested that the UN Security Council adopt the Geneva document, but our partners were not willing to do so,” Lavrov said, voicing criticism of calls from Western powers for Assad to stand down.

“We do not want to change regimes,” he said, insisting that “Russia is defending the Syrian people, not President Bashar al-Assad,” who remains a staunch ally of Moscow, which along with Beijing has blocked UN attempts to act against Damascus.

Lavrov, who met his Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) counterparts as part of a regular dialogue between the two sides, dismissed last Sunday’s formation in Qatar of a wider coalition of Syrian groups opposed to Assad.

“There was no unification of all the opposition,” he said, charging that the National Coalition only “unified the groups represented in Doha.”

“The pioneering groups of the opposition did not go to Doha,” where Qatar and the Arab League sponsored marathon talks last week to broaden the opposition beyond the Syrian National Council.

“We are seeking to unify the Syrian opposition. We call on all of the opponents to unite and form a delegation for negotiations,” he said. “We want to bring in the opposition within Syria.”

In contrast to Russia, the six-nation GCC — grouping Saudi Arabia with Bahrain, Oman, Kuwait, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates — was the first to recognise the National Coalition.