Saudi Arabia's foreign minister Adel Al Jubeir addresses delegates at an international security summit in Manama on October 31. Hasan Jamali / AP Photo
Saudi Arabia's foreign minister Adel Al Jubeir addresses delegates at an international security summit in Manama on October 31. Hasan Jamali / AP Photo

Syria negotiations in Vienna ‘failed to reach agreement’



MANAMA // An initial round of negotiations over ending the war in Syria – the first to include all foreign powers involved in the conflict – failed to reach agreement on the key issues of the time frame for Bashar Al Assad’s departure and the exit of foreign forces supporting Damascus, Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister has said.

“Until that is achieved the Syrian crisis will continue,” Adel Al Jubeir said on Saturday at a regional security conference in Manama.

The two days of talks in Vienna that ended on Friday were described by US secretary of state John Kerry as the “beginning of a new diplomatic process, not the final chapter”, according to US deputy secretary of state Antony Blinken.

“There is a renewed sense that there is a diplomatic way forward,” he said in Manama, adding, however, that this “doesn’t mean it’s going to happen in a space of one or two or three meetings”.

Mr Blinken also announced nearly US$100 million (Dh367.3m) in new US aid for the Syrian opposition.

The talks were spurred by Russia’s direct military entry into the conflict last month, and marked the first time that Iran had been invited to the table. Iran’s involvement in the talks has been described by diplomats as a sign of the seriousness of the diplomatic efforts given Tehran’s deep involvement in the conflict and backing for the Syrian president.

The negotiations were led by the United States, and also attended by the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Russia, France, Turkey and Britain. The sides agreed on a number of points that could form part of a framework deal for an eventual political transition. These included Syria’s territorial integrity, the writing of a new constitution that guarantees the rights of minorities, and presidential elections, Mr Al Jubeir said.

He added that Iran expressed commitment to a mechanism that would allow better access for humanitarian aid to reach civilians in the country’s conflict zones.

The regional countries backing Syrian rebels have demanded that Mr Al Assad depart at the beginning of a political transition and devolve his authority to a transitional body made up of representatives from all of the country’s groups. This would take four to six months, Mr Al Jubeir said. Western countries also maintain that the Syrian president must go, but are more flexible about when that would happen. Russia and Iran say they are not tied to Mr Al Assad, but that he can only go after extremists in Syria are defeated. It is not clear whether any progress was made in Vienna towards closing this gap. Officials familiar with the two sides’ positions in Vienna said the Russians support a plan that would see Mr Al Assad leave after 18 months.

Mr Al Jubeir responded to a question between the disparity in time frames by saying that “18-24 months has nothing to do with the departure of Assad”. He said that this longer time frame had only been discussed in relation to the drafting of a constitution and election laws, and the resettlement of displaced Syrians.

British foreign minister Philip Hammond implied on Saturday in Manama that the Iranian and Russian positions were even further from those of Western and Arab countries than Mr Al Jubeir had suggested. He said they maintain that Mr Al Assad should be allowed a role in the democratic process.

“There is still a huge gap,” he added.

However, he did not specify if Tehran and Moscow share the same position on Mr Al Assad’s departure, or if there are differences.

Another round of talks in Vienna will be held within two weeks, and Mr Al Jubeir said he expected the next talks to be “much more focused”.

Russia’s intervention to reinforce Mr Al Assad’s faltering military against rebels backed by Arab countries and the West appeared to many to have upended any remnants of a US strategy to push Mr Al Assad to the negotiating table.

But Mr Blinken said Russia had made a strategic mistake that would eventually work in the Syrian opposition’s favour.

“It will increase the conflict’s leverage over Russia and that in turn creates an internal incentive for Russia to work for, not against, a political transition,” he said.

“Russian cannot afford to sustain its military onslaught ... Costs will mount every day in economic, political and security terms.”

tkhan@thenational.ae

* With additional reporting by Associated Press

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Iran's dirty tricks to dodge sanctions

There’s increased scrutiny on the tricks being used to keep commodities flowing to and from blacklisted countries. Here’s a description of how some work.

1 Going Dark

A common method to transport Iranian oil with stealth is to turn off the Automatic Identification System, an electronic device that pinpoints a ship’s location. Known as going dark, a vessel flicks the switch before berthing and typically reappears days later, masking the location of its load or discharge port.

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A first vessel will take its clandestine cargo away from the country in question before transferring it to a waiting ship, all of this happening out of sight. The vessels will then sail in different directions. For about a third of Iranian exports, more than one tanker typically handles a load before it’s delivered to its final destination, analysts say.

3. Fake Destinations

Signaling the wrong destination to load or unload is another technique. Ships that intend to take cargo from Iran may indicate their loading ports in sanction-free places like Iraq. Ships can keep changing their destinations and end up not berthing at any of them.

4. Rebranded Barrels

Iranian barrels can also be rebranded as oil from a nation free from sanctions such as Iraq. The countries share fields along their border and the crude has similar characteristics. Oil from these deposits can be trucked out to another port and documents forged to hide Iran as the origin.

* Bloomberg

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Blockchain is a form of distributed ledger technology, a digital system in which data is recorded across multiple places at the same time. Unlike traditional databases, DLTs have no central administrator or centralised data storage. They are transparent because the data is visible and, because they are automatically replicated and impossible to be tampered with, they are secure.

The main difference between blockchain and other forms of DLT is the way data is stored as ‘blocks’ – new transactions are added to the existing ‘chain’ of past transactions, hence the name ‘blockchain’. It is impossible to delete or modify information on the chain due to the replication of blocks across various locations.

Blockchain is mostly associated with cryptocurrency Bitcoin. Due to the inability to tamper with transactions, advocates say this makes the currency more secure and safer than traditional systems. It is maintained by a network of people referred to as ‘miners’, who receive rewards for solving complex mathematical equations that enable transactions to go through.

However, one of the major problems that has come to light has been the presence of illicit material buried in the Bitcoin blockchain, linking it to the dark web.

Other blockchain platforms can offer things like smart contracts, which are automatically implemented when specific conditions from all interested parties are reached, cutting the time involved and the risk of mistakes. Another use could be storing medical records, as patients can be confident their information cannot be changed. The technology can also be used in supply chains, voting and has the potential to used for storing property records.

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One in nine do not have enough to eat

Created in 1961, the World Food Programme is pledged to fight hunger worldwide as well as providing emergency food assistance in a crisis.

One of the organisation’s goals is the Zero Hunger Pledge, adopted by the international community in 2015 as one of the 17 Sustainable Goals for Sustainable Development, to end world hunger by 2030.

The WFP, a branch of the United Nations, is funded by voluntary donations from governments, businesses and private donations.

Almost two thirds of its operations currently take place in conflict zones, where it is calculated that people are more than three times likely to suffer from malnutrition than in peaceful countries.

It is currently estimated that one in nine people globally do not have enough to eat.

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Outside emergencies, the WFP provides school meals to up to 25 million children in 63 countries, while working with communities to improve nutrition. Where possible, it buys supplies from developing countries to cut down transport cost and boost local economies.

 

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What went into the film

25 visual effects (VFX) studios

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1,000 VFX artists

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10 Concept artists, 25 3D designers

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