Annan to arrive in Tehran for consultations on Syria
IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency
Tehran, July 9, IRNA -- United Nations special envoy on Syria Kofi Annan will arrive in Tehran later in the day for consultations with senior Iranian officials on ways to end conflicts in Syria.
Annan who visited Syria on Sunday held a joint press conference with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad earlier in the day.
He termed his consultations with President al-Assad as constructive and friendly.
Annan had declared earlier that he would brief Syria and Iran on outcome of the Geneva meeting on Syria held last week.
Representatives of five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council plus Turkey, Kuwait, Iraq, Qatar, secretary-general of the Arab League Nabil al-Araby and the European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton attended the Geneva meeting on Syria last week to find a way out of the current crisis in Syria.
President Assad said in a TV interview that Washington was moving to "destabilize" Syria by giving political support to armed gangs.
He said that "supporters of the government, the victims from the security and the army personnel far outnumber those among civilians, and that an opposition made up of terrorists and gangs, "a mixture, an amalgam of al Qaeda and other extremists" is responsible for the violence.
When asked directly about the killing of more than 100 civilians in the Syrian village of Houla in May, he blamed it on gangs who "came in hundreds from outside the city".
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Islamic Republic News Agency/IRNA NewsCode: 1022622
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