Astana remains platform for working out Syrian settlement solutions, Russian senator

ASTANA. KAZINFORM Talks in Kazakhstan's capital of Astana remain an effective platform where the sides work out solutions on settling the Syrian crisis, Russian Federation Council (the upper house of parliament) Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Konstantin Kosachev said on Thursday.

"Astana offered a shoulder to lean on, probably at the most challenging moment of settlement, when it was necessary to bring together rivalling positions of many external factors on this track. Astana was and I'm sure will remain a platform where substantive, constructive and sustainable solutions will be worked out," Kosachev told a meeting with Kazakhstan's senators with the delegation of the Russian upper house of parliament, the Federation Council, on the issues of inter-parliamentary cooperation in Astana, TASS reports.

The next international meeting on Syria in Astana is scheduled for this April. The previous high-level meeting on Syria in the Kazakh capital with participation of the Russian, Iranian and Turkish deputy foreign ministers was held on November 28-29, 2018. The sides focused on the situation in the Idlib Governorate and the creation of the Syrian constitutional committee.