Russia flies military aid to Syria as UN-led talks continue

BEIRUT Russia has flown military jets and artillery to Syria, according to a U.S. official, raising concerns among Syrian opposition groups that the move would derail United Nations efforts to end the conflict.

The U.S. is not sure whether the Russian equipment sent to the Syrian air base in Latakia in the past three or four days is meant to support the government of President Bashar al-Assad or fight Islamic State militants, said the official, who asked not to be identified discussing sensitive information.

The Russian arsenal currently includes four Su-27 Flanker air-to-air fighters, 12 Su-24 Fencer low-level attack jets and 12 Su-25 Frogfoot air-to-ground fighters comparable to U.S. A-10 Warthog, the U.S. official said on Monday. It also comprises MI-17, M-24 helicopters, field artillery and armored personnel carriers.

Russia’s expanding military role in Syria comes as the U.N. Syria envoy, Staffan De Mistura, is pressing ahead with an initiative meant to break the impasse in the war, which has killed 250,000 people in more than four years. The U.N. envoy is assembling working groups of Syrian government and opposition figures for a process dubbed Geneva 3, after two inconclusive rounds of talks in the Swiss city.

Although U.S.-led coalition air strikes are estimated to have stripped Islamic State of about 30 percent of its territory, they haven’t been able to eliminate the group, which controls half of Syria as well as key provinces in Iraq.

Hassan Abdel Azim, a member of a Damascus-based opposition group taking part in the talks, said he was concerned the recent Russian moves would derail De Mistura’s efforts.

“We worry the political regime in Syria would interpret the Russian presence as a support for it and for its rejection of a political solution,” said Abdel Azim from Damascus.

Assad has repeatedly rejected calls to step down, telling Russian media this month the president “comes to power with the consent of the people, through elections, and he leaves at the request of the people, not by a decision of the U.S., the U.N. Security Council, the Geneva Conference or the Geneva Communique.”

Anwar Eshki, a retired Saudi general who heads the Middle East Center for Strategic and Legal Studies, said the Russian presence is not meant to shore up Assad because Moscow knows quite well that “Bashar will go.”

“But its commitments to Bashar stipulate that he stay as part of a transitional period,” a condition Saudi Arabia, which opposes Assad, would tolerate as long as the president was stripped of his powers, Eshki said by phone from the Saudi city of Jeddah.

Eshki said the Russian involvement will lead to stability in Syria, which will give the effort against Islamic State a better chance to succeed. The Syrian opposition should “put its hand in Russia’s hand” in order to bring about that stability, he added.

“The Russian presence will prevent the expansion of Daesh and its occupation of areas” during the transitional period, he said, using an Arabic acronym for the group.

(Donna Abu-Nasr reported from Beirut. Tony Capaccio reported from Washington.)

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