Joint Statement by the President of the United States and the President of the Russian Federation
President Trump and President Putin today, meeting on the margins of the APEC conference in Da Nang, Vietnam, confirmed their determination to defeat ISIS in Syria. They expressed their satisfaction with successful U.S.-Russia enhanced de-confliction efforts between U.S. and Russian military professionals that have dramatically accelerated ISIS’s losses on the battlefield in recent months.
The Presidents agreed to maintain open military channels of communication between military professionals to help ensure the safety of both U.S. and Russian forces and de-confliction of partnered forces engaged in the fight against ISIS. They confirmed these efforts will be continued until the final defeat of ISIS is achieved.
The Presidents agreed that there is no military solution to the conflict in Syria. They confirmed that the ultimate political solution to the conflict must be forged through the Geneva process pursuant to UNSCR 2254. They also took note of President Asad’s recent commitment to the Geneva process and constitutional reform and elections as called for under UNSCR 2254.
The two Presidents affirmed that these steps must include full implementation of UNSCR 2254, including constitutional reform and free and fair elections under UN supervision, held to the highest international standards of transparency, with all Syrians, including members of the diaspora, eligible to participate. The Presidents affirmed their commitment to Syria’s sovereignty, unity, independence, territorial integrity, and non-sectarian character, as defined in UNSCR 2254, and urged all Syrian parties to participate actively in the Geneva political process and to support efforts to ensure its success.
Finally President Trump and President Putin confirmed the importance of de-escalation areas as an interim step to reduce violence in Syria, enforce ceasefire agreements, facilitate unhindered humanitarian access, and set the conditions for the ultimate political solution to the conflict. They reviewed progress on the ceasefire in southwest Syria that was finalized the last time the two Presidents met in Hamburg, Germany on July 7, 2017.
The two presidents, today, welcomed the Memorandum of Principles concluded in Amman, Jordan, on November 8, 2017, between the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, the Russian Federation, and the United States of America. This Memorandum reinforces the success of the ceasefire initiative, to include the reduction, and ultimate elimination, of foreign forces and foreign fighters from the area to ensure a more sustainable peace. Monitoring this ceasefire arrangement will continue to take place through the Amman Monitoring Center, with participation by expert teams from the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, the Russian Federation, and the United States.
The two Presidents discussed the ongoing need to reduce human suffering in Syria and called on all UN member states to increase their contributions to address these humanitarian needs over the coming months.
In addition, President Trump noted that he had a good meeting with President Putin. He further noted that the successful implementation of the agreements announced today will save thousands of lives.
Background Briefing on the Joint Statement by the President of the United States And the President of the Russian Federation on Syria
MODERATOR: Thank you so much, and thank you, everyone, for joining us this weekend on a call to discuss this joint statement that was released earlier today on Syria by President Trump and also President Putin. The call will be on background attributable to senior State Department officials. Today we have [Senior State Department Official One], who will be referred to as Senior State Department Official Number One, please, and also [Senior State Department Official Two], who will be referred to as Senior State Department Official Number Two. We have about 30 minutes for the call. I’d like you to please limit your questions to one question per journalist so we can try to reach as many reporters as possible. The call will be embargoed until the conclusion of that.
And with that, let me turn it over to Senior State Department Official Number One for his opening comments. [Senior State Department Official One.]
SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL ONE: Great. Thank you, [Moderator]. So let me provide some background, opening about six or seven minutes or so, provide some background on the joint statement on Syria that issued today following the discussion between President Trump and President Putin on the margins of the APEC conference.
And this statement really builds on months of fairly intense discussions with the Russians and a lot of behind-the-scenes diplomacy led by Secretary Tillerson with the support of our military teams. And another round of those discussions took place last week in Amman and made some progress on some of the areas underlying the joint statement that issued today. And Secretary Tillerson and Foreign Minister Lavrov were able to close some gaps that remained over the course of the discussion on the margins of APEC.
I would describe these discussions with the Russians as quite intense, difficult, but also professional and ultimately constructive. And we’ve been able in recent months to work through some extremely difficult issues on Syria, which remains one of the most complex foreign policy challenges we confront.
So let me break down the statement with some background. I think as you’ll recall, shortly after taking office Secretary Tillerson set forth a vision for a new U.S. approach on Syria really grounded in three key elements. First, we must and we will prioritize the defeat and the enduring defeat of ISIS, and President Trump directed early on that we streamline the decision-making process to free up our military commanders to accelerate the campaign on the ground.
The strategic review, under the direction of Secretary Mattis, then led to a dramatically accelerated campaign, the results of which are now visible on the ground. And Secretary Mattis, during a coalition meeting in Brussels earlier this week, on Thursday, noted that 95 percent now of the territory once held by ISIS is now freed, and our partners are continuing to secure more territory each day.
Second, the second area, we must work to consolidate these military gains through stabilization assistance and critically de-escalate the civil war in Syria. The underlying civil war threatens American interests by driving extremism, increasing Iranian influence, undermine the security of Syria’s neighbors including Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Iraq, and Turkey, and increasing refugee flows.
In April, the Secretary discussed a vision for de-escalation zones during a Moscow visit with President Putin, and that overall vision has really defined subsequent international diplomacy on Syria. It resulted in a reduction of violence throughout the country and unprecedented pressure on ISIS and beginning to set the conditions now for a meaningful political process.
The third area, we must facilitate UN-led efforts to effect a political resolution to the conflict. As the Secretary has stated a number of times, it remains our view that a new and stable Syria under a more stable – and a more stable region will ultimately require new leadership in Damascus and the departure of President Assad from the scene. This must occur, however, as part of a political process that allows the entirety of the Syrian people, including the millions displaced by this horrific conflict, to determine their future free from threat, intimidation, and all foreign interference, and ultimately through UN-supervised and organized parliamentary and presidential elections.
So if you think of this in phases, phase one is really the defeat of ISIS. It’s hard to see Syria stabilizing when ISIS retains a so-called caliphate in what used to be about a third of the country. The second phase, and working in parallel, is to establish de-escalation zones and bring down the levels of violence in the country, with the third phase then leading to the political process to ultimately end the overall civil war.
So the joint statement approved today by President Trump and President Putin codifies areas of agreement in each of these three areas. It also does not sugarcoat differences that remain, and we still have work to do as we emerge from the primary focus on ISIS to the next phase of the campaign, locking in de-escalation areas to set conditions for a meaningful political process through Geneva to take hold.
The statement also reflects our view, as the President discussed earlier today, that despite our many differences with Russia, our two countries are capable of working together on difficult problems where interests converge and our doing so is profoundly in our national security interest. Perhaps nowhere is that more true than in Syria. The reality on the ground in Syria and those with influence is something we must take account of when developing our own approaches. We have made clear we will not work with the Assad regime, we will not obviously work with the Iranians who share fundamentally divergent interests from ours, therefore we must find opportunities to work with Russia where we can, seek to narrow differences where possible, mindful of the gaps that will inevitably remain.
So turning to the details of the statement, I’ll discuss each of the three areas I just outlined: military deconfliction to accelerate pressure on ISIS, strengthening the southwest ceasefire and de-escalation zones, and agreeing on key principles of the Geneva-based political process.
So the first area – the statement is really kind of divided into these three areas. The first area – deconfliction and the counter-ISIS campaign. As the campaign against ISIS has progressed, coalition-backed and Russian-backed forces have increasingly converged on the battlefield, necessitating a greater degree of operational deconfliction to prevent accidents and unintended escalations of force. Over the past 10 months we’ve worked to strengthen professional military channels of communication with Russia at the tactical and operational levels. This is to ensure that we can protect our people and our partner forces and focus maximum focus where it belongs, on the defeat of ISIS.
While not without challenges, these arrangements have served its purpose to date, thanks to the leadership of Secretary Mattis, General Dunford, General Votel, and our commanders in theater – Lieutenant General Steve Townsend till around September and now Lieutenant General Paul Funk, who recently assumed command. And they’re doing a great job, a remarkable job, and we remain closely latched up between military and diplomatic channels as the campaign has dramatically accelerated over the past year.
So today, importantly, President Trump and President Putin expressed their satisfaction with these arrangements and confirmed that they would continue until the final defeat – the final defeat of ISIS – is achieved. The joint statement reflects our shared commitment and agreement from the highest levels that military discussions and deconfliction channels has remained professional, served to avoid misunderstandings, and maximized the pressure on ISIS.
And this pressure on ISIS cannot be overstated. For the first time, the end of the physical caliphate, the so-called ISIS caliphate from where terror attacks were planned and launched around the world, is clearly in sight. While this will not end the threat of the ISIS, it is a significant milestone in the campaign and the result of the accelerants put in place at the direction of the President and Secretary Mattis earlier this year.
The statement also affirmed understandings that these deconfliction arrangements as well as de-escalation areas are interim measures to create conditions under which terrorists can be defeated, military gains consolidated, our partner forces can be secure, and the political process can advance pursuant to UN Security Council Resolution 2254, which I’ll discuss in a minute.
Both U.S. and Russia finally, as the statement states, are firmly committed to the territorial integrity of Syria, a principle the presidents affirmed today in the joint statement. De-escalation zones, for example, and deconfliction arrangements are designed to reduce violence and create conditions for Syrians to return to their homes and a political process to take hold. They are not aimed at partitioning Syria or dividing Syria into spheres of influence.
The second area of the statement is the de-escalation of the civil war and de-escalation zones, particularly the southwest. The presidents welcomed and endorsed, importantly, the U.S.-Russia-Jordan Memorandum of Principles, what we call the MOP, for de-escalation in southwest Syria. And this document was initialed on Wednesday night, November 8th, in Amman, Jordan. This understanding builds on and expands the July 7th ceasefire arrangement finalized during the last meeting between President Trump and President Putin in Hamburg, Germany, in July.
So the memorandum builds on the ceasefire arrangement really in three important areas. Let me just break them down.
First, the memorandum initialed in Amman earlier this week gives greater definition to the rules and mechanisms to monitor and strengthen the ceasefire and related efforts like humanitarian assistance. And while not perfect, the ceasefire that was put in place in July has largely held. Violence in this area has been significantly reduced, and thousands of Syrian families have returned to their homes. The presidents also recognized the work of U.S., Jordanian, and Russian military and diplomatic professionals and what we call the Amman Monitoring Center, which maintains contact with the many actors on the ground to prevent violations of the ceasefire and address them when they occur.
Second, the memorandum initialed in Amman and endorsed by the presidents today reflects the trilateral commitment that existing governance and administrative arrangements in opposition-held areas in the southwest will be maintained during this transitional phase. In other words, the opposition is not surrendering territory to the regime, deferring those questions of longer-term political arrangements to the political process under UN Security Council Resolution 2254. So this is an important principle that the memorandum initialed in Amman memorializes and the presidents confirmed.
Third and perhaps most important, the MOP, what we call the MOP, enshrines the commitment of the U.S., Russia, and Jordan to eliminate the presence of non-Syrian foreign forces. That includes Iranian forces and Iranian-backed militias like Lebanese Hizbollah as well as foreign jihadis working with Jabhat al-Nusrah and other extremist groups from the southwest area. These elements – these extremists groups and these foreign-backed militias – have used the Syrian conflict over the last five years to increase their presence in this part of Syria, which has undermined the ceasefire and poses a threat to Jordan and Israel. So we think this principle is quite important and it is enshrined in the agreement reached this week.
So on this last point specifically, the Russians have agreed to work with the Syrian regime to remove Iranian-backed forces a defined distance from opposition-held territory as well as the borders of the Golan in Jordan. For our part, we have agreed to work with Jordan and the opposition to reduce and ultimately eliminate the presence of foreign jihadis such as those fighting with Jabhat al-Nusrah from opposition-controlled territory. The bottom-line principle is that all foreign terrorists and militia fighters must leave these areas and ultimately leave Syria altogether.
The third part of the statement is focused on the political solution, the long-term solution to the conflict. So finally, the statement reflects agreement that there is no military solution to the Syrian conflict; the conflict can only be resolved long-term through peaceful political negotiations, which, as the statement says, must, must be grounded in Geneva and the Geneva-based political process. So the presidents reaffirmed their commitment to the blueprint for a political transition outlined in UN Security Council Resolution 2254, and that means negotiation under UN auspices in Geneva to draft a new constitution and hold UN-supervised elections to the highest international standards with the Syrian diaspora. That means the millions of Syrians who have been displaced in this terrible civil war will be eligible to vote, as the statement states very clearly.
The statement also expresses Assad’s recent commitments, for what they’re worth – the Geneva process, constitutional reform, and elections – and importantly makes clear that those commitments must be grounded in Security Council Resolution 2254.
The statement affirms that the political process, including constitutional reform and elections, therefore, must occur under the detailed blueprint outlined in the Security Council resolution through UN-led negotiations in Geneva and culminate in UN-supervised elections.
So why is that important? Secretary Tillerson felt that it was quite important to get President Putin on the record in this regard. We have started to see signs that the Russians and the regime wanted to draw the political process away from Geneva to a format that might be easier for the regime to manipulate. Today makes clear and the statement makes clear that 2254 and Geneva remains the exclusive platform for the political process, which, as the statement reaffirms, is the only way, long term, to end the Syrian civil war.
So the goal of the Geneva process under the auspices of Staffan de Mistura is to move as quickly as possible towards a new constitution and especially UN-supervised parliamentary and presidential elections. And at the end of this political process, as I stated at the opening, Syria and the broader region cannot be stable nor can there be any significant reconstruction assistance to regime-held areas, importantly, so long as Assad remains in power.
So just to sum up Syria in terms of these phases: Phase number one, maximizing pressure and defeating ISIS, defeating the physical caliphate, which is now – the end of the caliphate is clearly in sight; the second phase, working to establish de-escalation areas and deconfliction zones to bring violence down to set the conditions for the third phase, which is a meaningful political process focused in Geneva under 2254. That is the exclusive basis for legitimacy for the political process, at the end of which there has to be a transition in Damascus.
Πηγή:U.S. Department of State
Τελευταία ενημέρωση 12.11.2017
