Kerry announces ‘provisional’ Syria ceasefire deal

US Secretary of State John Kerry says Sunday that a “provisional agreement” has been reached on a ceasefire that could begin in the next few days in Syria’s five-year civil war.

Kerry says he spoke in the morning with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to discuss terms of a ceasefire and the two now must reach out to the parties in the conflict.

“There is a stark choice for everybody here,” Kerry says.

He declines to go into the details of the agreement because all parties need to be fully consulted. Kerry says he hopes US President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin would talk soon and that after that, implementation could begin.

The Russian Foreign Ministry says Lavrov and Kerry spoke on the phone Sunday for a second day in a row and discussed “the modality and conditions” for a ceasefire in Syria that would exclude groups that the UN Security Council considers terrorist organizations.

— AP