Syria’s deputy foreign minister Faisal Muqdad welcomes Iranian Foreign Minister Mohamed Javad Zarif upon his arrival at Damascus international airport yesterday.
DPA
Beirut
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohamed Javad Zarif yesterday met Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to discuss Iranian proposals to end the Syrian conflict.
“The negotiations with the President al-Assad were good and they focused on solving the Syrian crisis,” Zarif said after the meeting, according to the Syrian state news agency Sana.
Iran, which provides key military and financial aid to Assad’s embattled regime, plans to put a four-point peace plan to the United Nations after consultations with regional powers.
“It is time for the other players as well as our neighbours to look into the truth and yield to the demands of the Syrian people and work towards fighting extremism, sectarianism and terrorism,” Zarif said.
The Iranian official arrived in Damascus in the afternoon after meetings with leaders in Lebanon and went straight into a meeting with Assad.
Iranian news agency Tasnim quoted foreign ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham as saying that the Iranian proposals were an updated version of a peace plan Tehran proposed to the UN last year.
According to a report in Lebanese newspaper Al Akhbar last year, the original plan involved a national unity government including the regime and representatives of the Damascus-based opposition - which has little credibility with armed rebel factions.
Powers would have been transferred from the president to the new government ahead of elections.
Speaking at a joint press conference with Lebanese Shia leader Nabih Berri in Beirut earlier yesterday, Zarif insisted that Iran was “a force in achieving peace in the region”.