Syria regime, rebels agree nationwide ceasefire

Yahoo – AFP, Layal Abou Rahal with Max Delany in Moscow, December 29, 2016

More than 310,000 people have been killed in Syria since the conflict
began in March 2011 (AFP Photo/George Ourfalian)

Beirut (AFP) - Syria's army and key ally Russia Thursday announced a nationwide ceasefire to take effect at midnight, in a potential major breakthrough after nearly six years of civil war.

The deal was brokered by Russia and Turkey, which back opposing sides in the conflict, but does not involve Washington, which has negotiated previous ceasefires with Moscow.

The agreement, hailed by Syria's government as a "real opportunity" to find a political solution to the war, comes a week after the regime recaptured second city Aleppo in a major blow to rebel forces.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, who announced the deal, said Damascus and the "main forces of the armed opposition" had inked a truce and a document expressing a readiness to start peace talks.

"Several hours ago, the event occurred that we have not only been waiting for but been working so much to hasten," Putin said in a meeting with his defence and foreign ministers.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan described the agreement as a "historic opportunity" to end the Syrian conflict, which has killed more than 310,000 people and forced millions from their homes.

Syria's army said it would halt all military operations from midnight (2200 GMT on Thursday) and a leading opposition body, the National Coalition, voiced its support for the truce.

Putin said he would also reduce Moscow's military contingent in Syria that has been flying a bombing campaign in support of President Bashar al-Assad since last year.

The Kremlin strongman, however, said Russia would continue to fight "terrorism" in Syria and maintain its support for the regime.

Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said seven opposition groups, including the powerful Ahrar al-Sham, had signed the deal and those who failed to adhere would be considered "terrorists".

Erdogan indicated Turkey would press on with its four-month incursion into Syria against Islamic State group (IS) jihadists and Kurdish militia.

Key moments in the Syrian conflict (AFP Photo/Thomas SAINT-CRICQ, 

Sabrina BLANCHARD)

Astana peace talks

Syria's army said the deal did not include IS and the former Al-Qaeda affiliate Al-Nusra Front, now rebranded the Fateh al-Sham Front.

That could cause complications in areas like Idlib in northwestern Syria, where Fateh al-Sham is allied with rebel groups that have signed on to the deal.

Syria's political opposition and rebels confirmed their backing for the truce, saying it applied to all parts of the country.

"The agreement is for all of Syria and contains no exceptions or preconditions," said Osama Abou Zeid, a legal adviser to rebel groups fighting under the Free Syrian Army banner.

The agreement comes after Turkey and Russia brokered a deal to allow the evacuation of tens of thousands of civilians and rebel fighters from Aleppo.

Moscow and Ankara are now pushing for peace talks between Damascus and the rebels to start soon in Kazakhstan's capital Astana.

"Now we need to do everything for these agreements to come into force, for them to work, so that the negotiating teams that have been or are being formed promptly and as soon as possible arrive in Astana," Putin said.

UN peace envoy Staffan de Mistura said he hoped the agreement would "pave the way for productive talks" in Kazakhstan, but also reiterated he wants negotiations mediated by his office to continue early next year.

Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks with Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu (R)

 during their meeting at the Kremlin in Moscow, on December 29, 2016 (AFP Photo/

Michael Klimentyev)

22 killed in rebel areas

Russia and Turkey have both said the peace talks they will supervise are meant to supplement UN-backed peace efforts, rather than replace them entirely.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that Russia, Turkey and Iran were arranging for the talks and pressing for other key international players to get involved.

Lavrov said Moscow would invite Egypt and try to attract other regional powers such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Iraq and Jordan.

He added Moscow would seek to involve US President-elect Donald Trump's administration once he takes office in less than a month, but the process does not appear to involve outgoing President Barack Obama's administration.

The US State Department called the ceasefire deal a "positive development" and said it hoped it would lead to fresh negotiations on Syria's political future.

Abou Zeid confirmed the truce deal was intended to pave the way for new talks in Astana, with the High Negotiations Committee that has represented the opposition at previous negotiations expected to participate.

Turkey has long backed Syria's opposition, and its relations with Russia soured last year after Ankara shot down a Russian warplane.

But the two countries have worked closely of late on Syria, and Turkey was conspicuously quiet as Assad's forces retook Aleppo.

In the hours before the ceasefire was to take effect, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitoring group, reported at least 22 civilians, including 10 children, were killed in air strikes and artillery fire on rebel-held territory near Damascus.

US President Barack Obama (L) and Russia's President Vladimir Putin 

before a meeting in Lima in November (AFP Photo/Brendan Smialowski)

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Archangel Michael on Putin - May 13, 2013 (An Hour with an Angel)

SB: Okay. Thank you, Lord. I’m going to put the Vladimir Putin question ahead of the Boston bombing question. I think a lot of Russian readers and listeners are wondering if they can trust Vladimir Putin.

Now, you’ve said he was in containment and he’s coming out of containment. Can you direct yourself to Russian listeners, please, and tell them what they need to know about Vladimir Putin, please?

AAM: Well, I will say that he has been gradually coming out of containment, and reintegrated, shall we say, into society and into his role and decisions. So what I say to you is be vigilant and be the observer. Do not get caught in what appears to be the drama of this readjustment of power. So, allow the shifting of the core and the centers of power to be adjusted.

Russia has a very important role to play in the future years, as I have said before. So, stand back, my friends. Be the observer. I am not asking you to extend your wholehearted trust and empathy to this individual. What I am asking you to do is to extend trust to your own discernment, because it is not 100 per cent clean, but it is not dirty either.

Archangel Michael: This is the Unfoldment of the Promise of the Mother – Sep 3, 2012 (Archangel Michael channeled by Linda Dillon)

“….  SB: I certainly hadn’t thought of it that way before, Lord. So that is very helpful. I’ll try to develop that myself in some articles.

Can we look at the containment effort, please, particularly in international affairs? So, a while back you said, “Well, Vladimir Putin and Bashar al Assad are in containment.”

Could we know what the impact of the containment of the leaders is, and the impact on the financial system and also on Disclosure, please?

AAM: The impact on the international front is a greater desire and a greater creation of peace. And we don’t just mean that in the absence of armed uprising and the various forms of aggression that your governments are known to undertake. Now, we are not suggesting that some aggressions do not continue. They have, far more than we would even desire. But they are being contained. They are being limited.

What is happening — think of it in a very practical kind of way — is that the leadership that has been contained is having very much a change of heart. What has happened is they are growing extremely, extremely weary. Because to continue in a controlling, aggressive, dare I say hateful, manner is spiritually exhausting.

So think of it has fighting 24/7, in your terms, against the walls of light. After a while, after a very short while, you are so exhausted of that struggle — and this is something that we are addressing to the human collective as well — you are so exhausted of the struggle that you simply let go. And in that you begin what we would call the reconstruction.

So that is what is happening. You notice usually, when I introduce myself to you, my beloved friends, is that I call myself a warrior of peace, not an emissary, not an ambassador, not a mediator. I am a warrior of peace. As are you, my beloved friend. That is why your desire for truth is unquenchable.

So what is happening on the international front is you are beginning to see a decline in what you think of, or consider, or is, aggressive controlling action. That is also true in terms of your financial systems upon the planet. Only the… well, there is desire for control. But what is taking place, and how this containment — yes, of course it entails a change of heart — but the change of heart is also done politically, economically, in a community way.

It is also that many that are involved in financial systems are saying, “This is too hard to maintain.” We are trying to bolster a system that, in fact, does not support, or does not work. So already alternative methods of what we would call equity equalization are already being put in place.

Now, that does not discount or cancel what you think of as NESARA. In fact, in many ways the containment efforts, which from our perspective have been very successful —not completed, but underway — but these containment efforts are a precursor to NESARA because those who would have been the most vocal, the most adamant opponents of change, of simply allowing the system to re-balance itself, will be gone, will not have that voice, not because they have been removed — although some of them have been — but because the desire to be the opponent is no longer there.

So, this is how containment is working.

Now, you are still seeing what we would see as a friction in duality. And this is growing in many ways. Again, it is the water pushing against the dam so that it can break loose. It is gaining force, it is gaining momentum, it is gaining speed — within the human realm as well, because people are increasingly tired of what is presented as oppressive, what is presented as separation, whether it is psychology, politics, or finance.

So this is also what the humans, the collective, are also undertaking.

So can you see that growing separation between those who wish for a very different reality and Earth? Yes. But that is also creating the momentum and the pressure for the breakthrough. So do not see this as entirely negative. It is not.

There have been questions and comments about what realms we see in the international arena as oppressive, as dictatorial, and yes, democracies, and why there are sometimes realms — even though they are either republics or parliamentary systems — which we say are oppressive regimes because they seek to control the masses.

So there has been an illusion that if you have voting power that somehow it creates a freedom. Is it an element of freedom? Yes. It is something that needs to be expanded and will completely, completely, shift in the fifth reality. It will not look or feel the same. It will not have the same constructs.

But do not delude yourselves, my brothers and sisters, that simply because you believe that you live in a democracy that you are not being cajoled and confused and controlled. You are.

And  the purpose of containment is to remove those elements. So understand, that is also why we did not simply go to what you think of as dictatorships or very oppressive regimes. Containment has been very active all over your planet. And you will be seeing changes in leadership.

I speak to this because when we have originally spoken of containment we have talked of many leaders, whether it is in political or social or financial-economic realms remaining in place. But we need to say to you that for those who simply continue to try and resist, there will be new leadership. If they do not wish to cooperate, then there will simply be the emergence of new human beings, starseeds, Earth-keepers, who will take those positions and who will lead Nova Earth and help with the reconstruction process.

So that has been a slight shift. Some are more, hmm, determined and stubborn in their resistance. That is all right. That is their freedom and their soul desire. That is fine. But it is not that it will go on indefinitely. It cannot, and it will not. ….”

You are already in a state of liberation from the old systems - Oct 29, 2012 (Constant Companions channeled through Aisha North)