叙利亚和谈将于3月14日在日内瓦正式重启

Syria peace talks are due to begin in Geneva today. Delegates from the Syrian government and the opposition have arrived. The spokesman of the opposition High Negotiations Committee (HNC), Salem al-Meslet, has pledged to stick with the talks, but repeated that President Bashar al-Assad could play no role in the planned transitional body.

"We are very much looking forward to the peace talks restarted on the 14th. We have come to discuss a political solution seeking to end the suffering of the Syrian people and we hope that the other party will be as serious as us. We are hoping the talks would begin with a discussion of the transitional body which would be imbued with all the powers, including those of the president," High Negotiations Committee spokesman Salem Al-Meslet said.

The opposition stressed that there will be no role within the transitional body for those who have worked for Assad. The HNC has repeatedly called for Assad's departure as a prerequisite for any deal.   But the head of the Syrian government delegation, Bashar al-Jaafari, says "there is nothing called the transition stage." And Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem also stressed their bottom line. He said they would not talk with anyone wants to discuss the presidency. He said talk of removing Assad would be a "red line". The crisis is approaching its fifth anniversary this week. Western states seem more determined than ever to bring an end to a war that has driven hundreds of thousands of refugees towards Europe, and helped the rise of the self-proclaimed Islamic State.