[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] The United States and Russia have agreed on a new cease-fire for Syria that will take effect Saturday, even as major questions over enforcing and responding to violations of the truce were left unresolved. Syria's warring government and rebels still need to accept the deal."Hello?"
"President Putin on the line for President Obama. Will you accept the charges?"
"Yeah, sure. Put them on our national tab..."
The timeline for a hoped-for breakthrough comes after the former Cold War foes, backing opposing sides in the conflict, said they finalized the details of a "cessation of hostilities" between
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneckal-Assad
Leveler of Latakia...
's government and armed opposition groups after five years of violence that has killed more than 250,000 people.
"President Obama..."
"Please! Call me Barack! We're on the same team. May I call you Vladimir?"
"No, Barack. We're not on the same team. And I prefer to be addressed as President Putin."
The truce will not cover the ISIS group, the al-Qaeda-linked Nusra Front and any other militias designated as terrorist organizations by the U.N. Security Council. But where in Syria the fighting must stop and where counterterrorism operations can continue must still be addressed. And the five-page plan released by the U.S. State Department leaves open how breaches of the cease-fire will be identified or punished.
"Okay, President Putin. We agree to the terms. How about the Syrians?"
"They don't agree, Barack."
The announcement came after Presidents Barack Obama
If you like your coverage you can keep it...
and Vladimir Putin
...Second and fourth President and sixth of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from polonium poisoning. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead...spoke by telephone Monday, capping weeks of intense diplomacy to stem the violence so that Assad's government and "moderate" rebel forces might return to peace talks in Geneva. A first round of indirect discussions collapsed almost immediately this month amid a massive government offensive backed by Russian