Washington, Moscow form group to implement Munich agreement on Syria

MUNICH, Feb 12 (KUNA) -- Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov announced on Friday formation of a working group to follow up immediately on implementation of the Munich agreement reached late on Thursday on Syria.
The group, including Russian and US diplomats as well as military personnel from the two sides, will hold its first meeting in Geneva soon, Lavrov added.
Russian aircraft will continue bombing posts of the so-called Islamic State and Al-Nusra Front, "the two terrorists groups", as the agreement pertaining to the cease-fire didn't include these two groups, he noted.
He called immediately for resuming the Geneva talks on Syria in order to continue efforts aiming to reach a peaceful solution to the crisis.
Under the agreement, hammered out in Munich, the major powers agreed to a cessation of hostilities in Syria, scheduled to begin within a week and to provide rapid humanitarian access to besieged towns of Syria, but they failed to agree on ending the Russian air bombing.
Meanwhile, the International Syria Support Group (ISSG) decided earlier that humanitarian access will commence this week to the besieged areas, and an ISSG task force will within one week work on mechanisms for a nationwide cessation of hostilities.
The group consists of the Arab League, China, Egypt, the European Union, France, Germany, Iran, Iraq, Italy, Jordan, Lebanon, the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, Oman, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, the United Nations and the United States.
The ISSG members unanimously declared that they would be committed to immediately facilitate full implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 2254, which was adopted unanimously in December.
Moreover, the accord calls for continuing the political process and underlines necessity of resuming the talks in Geneva as soon as possible.
Foreign ministers of seven countries, mainly the US, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Iran, reached late on Thursday an agreement on some items, including a cessation of hostilities in Syria within a week. (end) ang.hm