New hope for Syria

http://www.economist.com/news/middle-east-and-africa/21684537-diplomacy-now-full-swing-crucial-details-are-unresolved-ever-un-makes-bit

The UN makes a bit of progress in ending the Middle East’s most intractable war

Diplomacy is now in full swing, but crucial details are as unresolved as everDec 19th 2015 | NEW YORK | 

THOSE following diplomatic “road maps” in the Middle East often fail to reach their destination. So when the parties involved in Syria's nearly-five-year-old civil war produced a guide for ending that conflict last month, there was much scepticism. Pessimism is still warranted, but on December 18th more progress was made on the path to peace, as the United Nations Security Council unanimously passed a resolution calling for a ceasefire and talks between the Syrian government and opposition in early January.

The measure comes after months of negotiations between world powers, most notably America and Russia, which have been divided over the future of Syria. It is the first time the security council has endorsed a peace plan. And yet it is still far from clear that the agreement reached in New York will result in an end to the fighting, which has killed more than 250,000 people and caused more than 4m people to flee the country. “No one is sitting here today suggesting to anybody that the road ahead is a gilded path. It is complicated. It will remain complicated,” said John Kerry, America’s secretary of state.

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Many questions remain unanswered, the biggest of which concerns the fate of Bashar al-Assad, Syria’s authoritarian president, who is opposed by a patchwork of moderate and radical rebel groups. Elections are to be held within 18 months of the start of talks, according to the resolution, and it has for the moment been left unclear whether Mr Assad would be allowed to run; his position in the interim is also unclear. But Russia, which has bombed his opponents, does not want him removed ahead of time. “Only the Syrian people are going to decide their own future. That also covers the future of the Syrian president,” said Sergey Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister. This question alone has the obvious capability to be a show-stopper.

The difficult task of figuring out which rebel groups are moderate enough to be included in the talks is being left to Jordan. Even those that make the cut may refuse to sit down with Mr Assad, who himself has not agreed to participate. But the pressure is mounting on all sides. It seems increasingly clear that the Russians, who have quickly become bogged down in Syria, would like to find a way out of their war with Sunni Islam, while America and the Middle Eastern countries who supply the rebels are now doing a good job of forcing them to agree on a joint negotiating team.

A transitional government is to be formed in six months, says Mr Kerry, who added that demands for Mr Assad’s immediate departure were “prolonging the war”. But if the road map is followed—with the political process under UN control, and the Syrian diaspora allowed to vote—the odds are against Mr Assad retaining power.

The ceasefire will not apply to the whole country. Attacks by outside powers on Islamic State (IS) and Jabhat al-Nusra, the local al-Qaeda affiliate, will continue. Targeting Jabhat al-Nusra may be difficult, though, as it is working with the non-jihadist opposition. In the past Russia has used their proximity as a pretext for hitting rebel groups that will participate in the peace process.

Any sign of diplomatic progress in the Middle East is welcome, both in Syria and elsewhere (on December 17th Libya’s rival governments in the east and west of the country, at war for well over a year, signed a UN-sponsored agreement to form a national-unity government). But with over a dozen countries involved in the Syrian war, to say nothing of the factions inside the country, the hurdles on the path to peace are enormous.