\n As Syria plunged back into bloodshed and the UN suspended humanitarian aid convoys Tuesday, world powers struggled to convince themselves that a ceasefire can be salvaged.\n<\/p>\n
\n US Secretary of State John Kerry insisted that US-Russian attempts to broker a truce in the civil war are \"not dead\" and promised international talks will resume this week.\n<\/p>\n
\n President Barack Obama backed his top diplomat, saying a short time later that there was \"no ultimate military victory to be won\" and calling on nations to pursue the \"hard work\" of diplomacy.\n<\/p>\n
\n But Kerry's terse declaration, after a brief meeting in New York of the International Syria Support Group, could not conceal a pessimistic mood among his fellow foreign ministers.\n<\/p>\n
\n Kerry arrived for the ISSG meeting with his Russian opposite number and constant sparring partner Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, co-chair of the 23-nation group.\n<\/p>\n
\n Relations between the nominal partners were already at a low ebb after a mistaken US-led coalition air strike on Saturday killed dozens of Syrian soldiers.\n<\/p>\n
\n Then, on Monday, the negotiations appeared doomed after the Syrian army declared an end to the US-Russian brokered ceasefire and a UN aid convoy was hit in an air strike.\n<\/p>\n
\n But Kerry nevertheless took the opportunity of the ISSG members being gathered in New York for the United Nations General Assembly to convene crisis talks.\n<\/p>\n
\n The mood was grim and the brief meeting inconclusive, but it allowed Kerry and UN peace envoy Staffan de Mistura a chance to insist that the process has not collapsed.\n<\/p>\n
\n The talks lasted less than an hour and participants said the mood was tense but serious.\n<\/p>\n
\n Kerry's spokesman John Kirby said the ministers \"agreed that, despite continued violence, there was still an imperative to pursue a nationwide cessation of hostilities based on the arrangement reached last week in Geneva between the United States and Russia.\n<\/p>\n
\n \"Quite frankly, the Kerry-Lavrov process is the only show in town and we've got to get that show back on the road,\" Britain's Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said.\n<\/p>\n
\n His French counterpart Jean-Marc Ayrault warned that trust was breaking down in the US-Russian partnership and said other countries should help push the process forward.\n<\/p>\n
\n \"It was a fairly dramatic meeting, the mood was gloomy. Is there hope? I can't answer that yet, but we should do everything we can,\" he told reporters.\n<\/p>\n
\n \"The US-Russian negotiation has reached its limit. There's a lot left unsaid. The Russians and the Americans can't do it alone.\"\n<\/p>\n
\n Officials said participants had agreed to reconvene -- probably on Friday -- but analysts warned that more failures would not come without political costs.\n<\/p>\n
\n Without a ceasefire, attempts to deliver aid to starving civilians or to broker a political dialogue will fail.\n<\/p>\n
\n \"A failed ceasefire means that the other two prongs of the approach are doomed,\" Emile Hokayem from the International Institute for Strategic Studies told AFP.\n<\/p>\n
\n - 'Savage attack' -\n<\/p>\n
\n US officials have demanded that Russia take responsibility for what they said was an air strike on a UN aid convoy near the northern city of Aleppo by either Russian or allied Syrian warplanes.\n<\/p>\n
\n The Russian defense ministry has denied any role in the attack, attempting to point the figure at rebels against Bashar al-Assad's Syrian regime.\n<\/p>\n
\n A short distance across Manhattan at the UN meeting, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon denounced the \"sickening, savage and apparently deliberate attack\" that left around 20 dead.\n<\/p>\n
\n And Germany's Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier confirmed that it had poisoned the mood at the ISSG, where delegates were \"heavy with indignation.\"\n<\/p>\n
\n \"All were clearly aware of the fact that we find ourselves once more at a threshold for Syria,\" he said.\n<\/p>\n
\n \"There's only one viable path for Syria and that is to always make a new effort to reduce violence. In order to achieve this, also the regional powers have to do more.\"\n<\/p>\n
\n - Fighting rages -\n<\/p>\n
\n Meanwhile, air raids and shelling continued on frontlines around Syria, where more than 300,000 have died since Assad began efforts to suppress a popular revolt.\n<\/p>\n
\n The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 27 barrel bombs -- crude explosives packed with scraps of metal -- were dropped on Aleppo on Tuesday.\n<\/p>\n
\n Monday's strike on the aid convoy provoked outrage from UN officials, with aid chief Stephen O'Brien warning that if deliberate, \"it would amount to a war crime\".\n<\/p>\n
\n The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said Monday night's raid destroyed at least 18 of 31 vehicles and a Red Crescent warehouse.\n<\/p>\n
\n \"Much of the aid was destroyed,\" the IFRC said, stressing that \"the attack deprives thousands of civilians of much-needed food and medical assistance.\"\n<\/p>\n
\n Omar Barakat, who headed the local Red Crescent branch, was wounded in the strike and later died, IFRC spokesman Benoit Carpentier told reporters in Geneva.\n<\/p>\n
\n The strike came just hours after the Syrian army announced the end of the truce Monday, accusing rebels of failing to \"commit to a single element\" of the US-Russia deal.\n<\/p>\n
\n - 'Barrel bombs' -\n<\/p>\n
\n Aleppo residents spent the night huddled in their apartments sharing news via text messages and heard loud intermittent booms early Tuesday.\n<\/p>\n
\n The ceasefire was already under strain after a US-led coalition strike on Saturday hit a Syrian army post near the eastern city of Deir Ezzor.\n<\/p>\n
\n Washington says coalition forces were targeting the jihadist Islamic State group, which is not party to the ceasefire and hit the soldiers, by mistake.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
As Syria plunged back into bloodshed and the UN suspended humanitarian aid convoys Tuesday, world powers struggled to convince themselves that a ceasefire can be salvaged. US Secretary of State John Kerry insisted that US-Russian attempts to broker a truce in the civil war are \"not dead\" and promised international talks will resume this week. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":60,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[553],"tags":[],"ji_location":[],"class_list":["post-29102","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-live-feed"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n