Washington denies pressing for direct talks with Syrian government

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/01/washington-denies-direct-talks-syrian-government

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Washington on Saturday denied claims by Syria's foreign minister that US diplomats had sought to negotiate directly with their Syrian counterparts at last week's “Geneva II” peace conference in Switzerland.

The State Department spokeswoman, Jen Psaki, said the US had offered to connect with Syrian officials "on a staff level" through the United Nations and joint special representative, Lakhdar Brahimi.

"At no point did the United States offer to negotiate directly with the Syrian regime," she said, adding that the US had made similar offers throughout the conflict.

Psaki was responding to a query from Reuters after the Syrian foreign minister, Walid al-Moualem, said the Americans had requested direct negotiations in Montreux, the Swiss city where talks began on 22 January, before moving to Geneva.

"We refused to do so before Secretary of State John Kerry apologises for what he said at the conference," Moualem told reporters aboard the Syrian government delegation's flight back to Damascus.

In the comments, which were published by Syria's national news agency, Moualem did not specify what Kerry had said. But Psaki said such a gesture would not happen.

"At no point will Secretary Kerry ever apologise for speaking the truth about the brutality the Assad regime has inflicted on the people of Syria," she said.

A week-long first round of talks began with uncompromising speeches, by Kerry and Moualem among others, and repeatedly seemed on the verge of collapse before the two sides even entered the same room. The conference adjourned on Friday with no progress towards ending the civil war and the government unable to say whether it will return for the next round of negotiations, beginning on 10 February.

The comments came the same day as Kerry and the defence secretary, Chuck Hagel, attended an international security conference in Munich.