Syria Ceasefire Already Collapsing
Why cessation of hostilities will have little impact on the peace talks.
March 8, 2016
Joseph Klein
The two week “cessation of hostilities” within Syria is about to run out. Negotiated by the United States and Russia, who were responsible for bringing the parties over which they have influence along, the lull was intended as a confidence building measure and as a way of getting critical humanitarian supplies to besieged and hard to reach areas of Syria. Talks between Syrian government and opposition representatives are supposed to resume in Geneva on March 9th.
Secretary of State John Kerry hailed the agreement to temporarily halt the violence in a conflict that has taken more than 250,000 lives as “a moment of promise.” While there is evidence that the fighting has dropped noticeably overall since the cessation of hostilities went into effect on February 26, 2016,
the violence never really stopped. On the second day alone of the lull, there were reportedly “35 breaches, 27 by violations by government forces, 8 by Russian forces,” according to the
Syrian Network for Human Rights.
Airstrikes continued throughout Syria, some by Russia on the pretext that they were aimed at fighting ISIS and al Nusra. Rebel-held enclaves in and around Aleppo have come under particularly intense bombing attacks, said to be by Russian planes.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said last Saturday that 135 people have lost their lives in areas where there was supposed to be a pause in hostilities.
According to Israeli sources, the Syrian government has reportedly used chemical weapons against civilians since the cessation of hostilities were supposed to go into effect.
The United Nations has nevertheless been able to use the drop in hostilities to deliver some desperately needed humanitarian relief, although it has been stymied by bureaucratic obstacles put in the UN’s way by Syrian authorities. Sometimes, Syrian officials have gone so far as removing medical supplies from humanitarian convoys that had received permission to deliver their cargoes.
Perhaps the United States and Russia will push for an extension of the cessation of hostilities. Kerry and his Russian counterpart, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, have called for a prompt resumption of the peace talks in Syria, which would be hard to assemble if fighting resumes full throttle. They are evidently hoping that the partial success of the lull in fighting so far will provide momentum for successful talks. If so, they are dreaming. Kerry in particular is relying on the fatally flawed road map to a negotiated political solution in Syria that was laid out in last December’s UN Security Council Resolution 2258 (2015). As I wrote last December when the resolution was adopted, the players were simply
kicking the can down the road to no avail.
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Syria Ceasefire Already Collapsing
