Russian Federation willing to support 48-hour Syria cease-fire

The timing of these deliberations coincides with John Kerry, the US Secretary of State, threatening to stop any diplomatic activities with Russian Federation on the issue of Syria.

Hours after Russian Federation vowed to continue its air strikes in Aleppo, Kerry said Thursday that bilaterial engagement with Russian Federation over Syria is “irrational in the context of the kind of bombing taking place”.

The United States warned Thursday that it is on the brink of ending talks with Russian Federation over the assault on Aleppo, where the United Nations says a humanitarian catastrophe is unfolding unlike any witnessed so far in Syria’s brutal five-year war.

On Tuesday, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said the U.S.is considering seeking worldwide sanctions against Russians involved in assisting the Syrian government’s conduct in the war.

“These thinly disguised invitations to use terrorism as a weapon against Russian Federation show the political depths the current U.S. administration has stooped to in its approach to the Middle East and specifically to Syria”.

New Zealand UN Ambassador Gerard van Bohemen, president of the council for September, said after the council meeting that members expressed a “great deal of interest” in seeing the French text and a willingness to work on it.

The conversation between the diplomats followed a short-term cease-fire that began earlier this month in Syria between President Bashar al-Assad’s regime and a consolidated group of Syrian rebels.

Moscow said Wednesday that they would send representatives to Geneva to discuss normalizing the situation in Aleppo with US diplomats.

The developments came as former United Nations secretary general Kofi Annan told Sky News that “proxy wars” in Syria could prolong the five-year-old conflict.

Kerry’s threat aside, the US has few other options beyond engaging Moscow to end the fighting between Assad’s forces and rebels.

In Aleppo, rescue crews were working for the third straight day to clear the rubble and search for survivors of presumed Russian or Syrian government air strikes on the eastern al-Shaar and al-Mashhad neighbourhoods that killed at least 23 civilians, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Russian Federation on Friday is marking the one year since it launched its air campaign in Syria in support of Syrian President Bashar Assad.

Russian Federation and its Syrian government allies say they are targeting only militants in Aleppo.

“It’s easy to be critical of diplomatic efforts because it’s hard, but what is the alternative?” said Kerry.

“Those using ever more destructive weapons know exactly they are doing”, said Ki-moon.

“The appalling attacks on Aleppo have shaken all of us, and the violence and the attacks we have seen… is morally totally unacceptable and is a blatant violation of global law”, Stoltenberg told a news conference in Bratislava.

“There’s nothing that the secretary’s going to apologize for, congressional criticism or not, about talking to the Russians, who have the most influence on Assad, to try to get this to stop”, Kirby said.