US must talk to Assad to end Syria war – Kerry

The United States will have to negotiate with Syrian President Bashar Assad to end the civil war now entering its fifth year, Secretary of State John Kerry concedes in an interview.

“Well, we have to negotiate in the end. We’ve always been willing to negotiate in the context of the Geneva I process,” Kerry says.

He stresses Washington is working hard to “re-ignite” efforts to find a political solution to end the war.

The United States helped lead international efforts to kick-start peace talks between Assad and a splintered Syrian opposition, bringing the two sides together in Geneva for the first time early last year.

But after two rounds of talks, the negotiations collapsed in bitter acrimony and no fresh negotiations have been scheduled while the scale of the killing and devastation has mounted.

“Assad didn’t want to negotiate,” Kerry tells CBS television.

“So if he’s ready to have a serious negotiation about the implementation of Geneva I, of course, if people are prepared to do that. And what we’re pushing for is to get him to come and do that,” he replied when asked if he would negotiate with Assad.

“This is one of the worst tragedies any of us have seen on the face of the planet,” Kerry says, in an interview recorded in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.

He insists that despite the challenge of the US-led fight against the Islamic State group which has seized territory in Iraq and Syria, Washington was still focused on ending the Syrian civil war.

“We are increasing our efforts in a very significant way, working with the moderate opposition, but doing much more than that also,” Kerry says.

“We’re also pursuing a diplomatic track. We have had conversations with a number of different critical players in this tragedy,” he says.

US President Barack Obama “is extremely seized of the issue and focused on it with the intent to see what we can do to change the dynamic,” he says.

—AFP