Next meeting on Syria in Astana format to be held in Sochi on July 30-31 – Moscow

The next meeting in the Astana format that will involve three Syrian ceasefire guarantor nations - Iran, Russia and Turkey - will be held in Sochi on July 30-31, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Vershinin said on Friday. “It will be held in the last two days of July, that has essentially been agreed, and in the format that we used before, that is, the three guarantor countries, the observer states and the Syrian parties,” he said. An important result of the Astana process is the setting up of the working group on exchanging detainees and bodies of those killed, TASS quoted Vershinin as saying. “This is hard work, but so far the only efforts which help establish trust between the parties to the conflict,” the diplomat said.