Russia, Iran, Turkey agree on truce

‘Women, children squeeze onto buses, many

in tears and others shivering in the cold’

MOSCOW: Russia, Iran and Turkey agreed on Tuesday to guarantee Syria peace talks and backed expanding a ceasefire in the war-torn country, the Russian foreign minister said after talks with counterparts.

“Iran, Russia and Turkey are ready to assist in preparing the agreement in the making between the Syrian government and the opposition and to become its guarantor,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in Moscow, citing a joint statement.

“The ministers agree with the importance of widening the ceasefire, of free access for humanitarian aid and movement of civilians on Syrian territory,” he added.

The foreign and defence ministers from key powerbrokers Russia, Iran and Turkey met in Moscow on Tuesday, the day after Russia’s envoy to Ankara was shot dead in the Turkish capital by a gunman shouting about Syria and Aleppo.

Russia and Iran are on the opposite side of the Syrian conflict from Turkey, with Moscow and Tehran backing President Bashar al-Assad and Ankara supporting those seeking to topple him. But Turkey and Russia have recently started working closely together to evacuate rebel fighters and civilians from war-battered Aleppo under a complex deal.

The Red Cross on Tuesday said that at least 25,000 people have left the eastern districts of Aleppo since evacuations began last week, and Lavrov said the process should be completed in two days at most.

“Right now the evacuation is wrapping up,” he said. “We hope that this is a question of one or a maximum of two days.”-AFP

Meanwhile, Syria’s army on Tuesday urged the last remaining rebels and civilians to leave the bombed-out eastern quarters of Aleppo as it prepares to take full control of the devastated city.

The evacuation of east Aleppo is seen as a pivotal moment in the nearly six-year war that has killed more than 310,000 people and triggered a major humanitarian and refugee crisis.

At least 25,000 people have left rebel districts of east Aleppo since evacuations began last week, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross, which is overseeing the operation. Thousands more were still waiting to be bused out, spokeswoman Ingy Sedky said. She said that 750 people had been evacuated in parallel from Fuaa and Kafraya, two Shiite-majority villages in northwest Syria besieged by rebels, as part of the deal.

In east Aleppo on Tuesday, soldiers using megaphones called on the remaining fighters and civilians to exit the opposition districts, a military source told AFP.

“The army is expected to enter Aleppo to clean the area after the fighters leave,” the source said.

Buses and ambulances have been bringing rebels and civilians on a tense journey from Aleppo’s battered east into government-held neighbourhoods, and back into rebel-held territory west of the city.

Thousands of people -- mostly women and children -- squeeze onto buses with whatever belongings they can carry, many in tears and others shivering in the cold, according to AFP correspondents who made the trip.