UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov agreed on Tuesday on the need to urgently implement the cessation of hostilities agreement in Syria and for the warring parties to return to the table for political negotiations, a UN statement said.
The statement, issued after the two held talks at the UN European headquarters in Geneva, said Ban thanked Lavrov for "his significant role in achieving recent progress on Syria."
"They agreed on the importance of urgently moving forward simultaneously on implementing the cessation of hostilities agreement, providing vital humanitarian assistance to civilians, and returning to political negotiations."
Assad says truce is ‘glimmer of hope’
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad described the cessation of hostilities which has been in force since Saturday as a "glimmer of hope" in an interview with German television to be aired on Tuesday.
"We will play our part to make the whole thing work," the president was quoted as saying in an extract of a 25-minute interview with broadcaster ARD's Weltspiegel Extra programme which will be aired in full later.
He also said people living in Syria were suffering from a "humanitarian disaster".
