Iran: Syria dialogue will not include armed opposition

Dialogue aimed at ending Syria’s seven-year long war will include the government, the people and the non-armed opposition, not the “terrorists” who destroyed the country, a senior Iranian official said yesterday.

Spokesman for the National Security and Foreign Policy Committee of Iran’s Parliament, Seyyed Hossein Naghavi-Hosseini, remarked on the trilateral meeting between Iran, Russia and Turkey in the Russian resort of Sochi saying: “We said from the beginning that the future of Syria is determined by the Syrians and regional and international players cannot make decisions on behalf of the Syrian people.”

“Iran will remain with the people and the government in Syria until the return of peace to this country,” he said, adding that Tehran is defending democracy and human rights in Syria.

“No place in the world would allow armed opposition to have a role in government and sovereignty,” he said, stressing that “the axis of resistance defeated Daesh in Syria.”

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“Some imagine that Daesh and the rest of the terrorists with new names can intervene in the future of Syria, which is rejected by the Syrian government.”

The second expanded conference of the Syrian opposition concluded in the Saudi capital Riyadh on Thursday. The participants stressed that there is no place for Syrian regime President Bashar Al-Assad group in the transitional phase in Syria.