Clinton, Lavrov to meet face-to-face for Syria discussion

PanARMENIAN.Net - U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov were heading for a face-to-face showdown over Syria on Friday, June 29, as major powers prepared for a weekend conference to hash out a political transition plan for the country.

According to the Associated Press, on the eve of Saturday's conference aimed at ending 16 months of brutal violence in Syria, Clinton and Lavrov were to meet in St. Petersburg in a bid to iron out deep differences over the transition plan being pushed by U.N. envoy Kofi Annan that calls for the formation of a national unity government that would oversee the drafting of a new constitution and elections.

U.S. officials are adamant that the plan will not allow Syrian President Bashar Assad to remain in power at the top of the transitional government, but Russia insists that outsiders cannot dictate the ultimate solution or the composition of the interim administration.

Annan's plan would allow some members of the current regime to stay in place but would exclude those deemed to be counterproductive or destructive to the transition process, which would be Syrian led, according to diplomats familiar with the proposal. It does not explicitly bar Assad, but the U.S. and other western powers who will participate in the conference in Geneva say that is implicit.

The difference in interpretation could prove its unraveling and Clinton hopes to press Lavrov on the point at their meeting and over dinner following a gathering of Asia-Pacific foreign ministers that Lavrov is hosting in St. Petersburg.

On Thursday, Lavrov acknowledged that a transition period is necessary to end the violence in Syria, but said Russia had not agreed to all elements of Annan's plan, in particular any suggestion that Assad would be required to leave.

Clinton, speaking Thursday in Riga, Latvia, said it was "very clear" that all participants in the Geneva meeting - including Russia - were on board with the transition plan. She told reporters that the invitations said made clear that representatives "were coming on the basis of (Annan's) transition plan."

She said she expects the meeting "to provide an opportunity to make real progress" on that plan.