ASTANA (Sputnik) — UN Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura is unlikely to join Russian-Iranian-Turkish consultations in Astana on Sunday ahead of the intra-Syrian talks, Minister-Counsellor of the Russian Embassy to Kazakhstan Alexander Musienko told Sputnik.
“De Mistura is unlikely to join today’s trilateral consultations,” Musienko said.
22 January 2017, 13:07 GMT
Sergey Vershinin, the director of the Middle East and North Africa Department at the Russian Foreign Ministry as well as Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Hussein Jaberi Ansari and Turkish Deputy Foreign Minister Sedat Onal are taking part in the Sunday preliminary consultations.
The Astana talks on Syrian settlement will start in the hotel Rixos President Astana at 07:00 GMT on January 23 and are expected to end at 07:00 GMT on January 24. The negotiations brokered by Russia, Turkey and Iran will be held behind closed doors.
