The joint Syria declaration was meant to jump-start the deadlocked peace process for the war-torn country after nearly 10 years of the armed conflict, Al Jazeera said.
The UN Security Council’s efforts weren’t crown by success on Tuesday when the diplomats failed to agree on a joint declaration on Syria.
Syria’s main ally, Russia, repeatedly blocked peace talks on the matter, diplomats said, although Moscow did not respond to a request for comment as to why.
Over ten years, the Syrian civil war has killed more than 500,000 people and displaced half the country’s pre-war 23 million population. Now, the Middle Eastern country requires peace and stability more than ever.
While the endless rounds of UN-backed peace talks in the decade failed, the parallel negotiations led by Russia and Turkey were successful. However, UN Special Envoy Geir Pedersen believes that the current divisions in the international community need to be bridged.
Pedersen said without “constructive international diplomacy” on Syria, it was unlikely that “any track – constitutional track or any other – will really move forward”.
Diplomats said the failure to agree on a declaration was due to Russia, which had made demands unacceptable to Western nations.
“The Russians are asking too much,” a diplomat said on condition of anonymity.
“Unfortunately, despite five rounds of discussions over the past year and a half, we regret that no substantial progress has been made at these meetings towards the drafting of a constitutional reform in line with Security Council Resolution 2254,” the UNSC resolution reads.
