Kerry in Moscow to bridge gap with Russia on Syria
Russia and US agree to hold Syria conference
(about 3 hours later)
US Secretary of State John Kerry has held talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow to try to bridge the divide between the two sides over the Syria conflict.
Russia and the US have agreed to work towards holding an international conference to find a political solution to the conflict in Syria.
Before the talks, Mr Kerry said Russia and the US shared common interests in promoting stability in the region.
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Secretary of State John Kerry announced it would follow on from an Action Group for Syria meeting in Geneva last June.
Moscow, which supports Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad, is refusing to back US pressure to force him to step down.
Mr Kerry said they would try to "bring both sides to the table".
The US recently said it did not rule out arming the Syrian opposition.
Relations between Moscow and Washington have been strained in the last two years by differences over Syria.
"Arming the rebels - that's an option," said US Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel last week.
'Important track'
Mr Kerry's visit comes days after Israel launched air strikes in southern Syria.
Mr Kerry held lengthy talks with President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday during his first visit to Moscow since becoming secretary of state.
Russia condemned the attacks - which Israeli sources said targeted missiles destined for Hezbollah in Lebanon - as a threat to regional stability.
He told Mr Putin that their two countries shared "some very significant common interests with respect to Syria", including "stability in the region" and "not letting extremists create problems".
President Putin had spoken to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the Kremlin said.
"It is my hope that today we will be able to dig into that a little bit, and see if we can find common ground," he added.
Chemical weapons
He then held further discussions with Mr Lavrov, after which they jointly announced that they would try to organise an international conference on ending the conflict in Syria, if possible before the end of May.
Ahead of Mr Kerry's visit, Russia's foreign ministry called on the West to stop politicising the issue of chemical weapons in Syria, BBC Moscow correspondent Steven Rosenberg reports.
It will try to convince both the Syrian government and opposition to accept a solution based on the core elements of the final communique issued on 30 June 2012, after the UN-backed Action Group for Syria meeting in Geneva.
It expressed concern that world public opinion was being prepared for possible military intervention, he adds.
The communique called for an immediate cessation of violence and the establishment of a transitional government that could include officials serving under President Bashar al-Assad and members of the opposition.
The UN has played down claims by one of its experts that there was evidence rebels had used nerve gas.
"We believe that the Geneva communique is the important track to end the bloodshed in Syria," Mr Kerry told a news conference.
Investigator Carla Del Ponte earlier said testimony from victims and doctors had given rise to "strong, concrete suspicions but not yet incontrovertible proof" that opposition forces had used sarin.
He added that a negotiated settlement would help avert the danger of Syria breaking up and might influence Washington's decision on whether or not to arm rebel groups.
But the Commission of Inquiry on Syria stressed on Monday it had not reached any "conclusive findings".
Mr Lavrov reaffirmed Moscow's belief that the departure of President Assad should not be a condition for peace talks, but insisted he was not trying to keep him in power.
Sarin, an extremely potent chemical nerve agent, is colourless and odourless. The use of chemical weapons is banned by most countries.
"We are not concerned by the fate of any individual. We are concerned by the fate of the Syrian people," he said.
In Washington, White House spokesman Jay Carney said it was "highly likely" that any use of chemical weapons that had taken place had been carried out by government forces.
Both the US and Israel have described the use of chemical weapons in the Syrian conflict as a "game-changer", which could trigger international military intervention.
'Particular alarm'
Correspondents say it is unlikely that Mr Kerry will be able to change President Putin's stance on Syria.
Moscow genuinely fears that a bad situation will get even worse if President Bashar al-Assad is pushed from power, and that Islamists will fill the void, reports the BBC's Steven Rosenberg in Moscow.
Officials said Israel's air strikes on Syrian army bases at the weekend had "caused particular alarm".
Unconfirmed reports from activists said as many as 42 soldiers had been killed in the attacks near Damascus.
"The further escalation of armed confrontation sharply increases the risk of creating new areas of tension and the destabilisation of the so-far relatively calm atmosphere on the Lebanese-Israeli border," Russia's foreign ministry said in a statement.
Israeli security sources said attacks on targets in southern Syria on Sunday were aimed at preventing the transfer of advanced Iranian-made missiles to the Shia Islamist movement, Hezbollah, in neighbouring Lebanon.
But observers say the latest developments indicate a significant escalation in Israel's involvement in the conflict.
The Syrian government called the attacks a "flagrant violation of international law", which had made the Middle East "more dangerous" and opened "the door wide to all possibilities".
After his visit to Russia, Mr Kerry will travel to Rome to meet Italian, Israeli and Jordanian officials to discuss Middle East issues, including the Palestinian-Israeli peace process.
