Iran to Present Syria Peace Plan to U.N.

A senior Iranian diplomat says the Islamic Republic plans to submit a new proposal to the United Nations (UN) to resolve the crisis in Syria.

“The Islamic Republic of Iran will submit its revised proposal on [resolving the crisis in] Syria to the UN Secretary General [Ban Ki-moon],” Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, the Iranian deputy foreign minister for Arab and African affairs, said in an interview with the Lebanese al-Mayadeen TV on Wednesday.

“The plan will be submitted to the UN secretary general after close consultations between Tehran and Damascus,” he added.

Last year, Iran proposed a peace plan emphasizing a political settlement to the crisis in Syria, the territorial integrity and independence of the Arab country as well as its people’s right to self-determination in a democratic election.

Amir-Abdollahian also dismissed the reports about the details of the new four-point proposal as “speculation.”

The top Iranian diplomat said Iran has held consultations with Qatar, Turkey, Egypt and the permanent members of the UN Security Council regarding the issue of Syria.

Commenting on the developments in Syria and the visit of Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallem, and Mikhail Bogdanov, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s special envoy for the Middle East and Africa, to Tehran, Amir-Abdollahian said, “Fortunately, a strategic change has occurred in the view of regional players regarding Syria.”

“If in the past four years most of the foreign countries considered resorting to war as a solution in Syria, now a large number of those countries have realized that resorting to and focusing on political solution are the most appropriate method to resolve the crisis in Syria,” he added.

The Syrian foreign minister and the Russian deputy foreign minister are in Iran to hold talks with Iranian and Russian officials over the crisis in Syria.

Syria has been fighting against massive foreign-sponsored militancy for the past four years. The conflict has reportedly killed an estimated 230,000 people so far, including nearly 11,500 children.

fair to share...