Syria peace talks start with uncertainty over the process

Long-anticipated peace talks that are projected to help bring an end to a five-year-old war in Syria finally started in Geneva on Jan. 29, albeit with many issues left uncertain and unexplained.
Efforts to bring all the sides to the negotiation table continued all day during Jan. 29, after the Saudi-backed High Negotiations Committee (HNC) announced that it would not attend the talks until assurances from the U.N. chief on the implementation of Security Council resolutions related to humanitarian issues occurred.

U.N. Special Envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura began by meeting Damascus' delegation, which is headed by the country's U.N. envoy, Bashar al-Jaafari, according to de Mistura's spokeswoman, Khawla Mattar. She said he would later meet other participants in the talks, including NGOs.

The opposition boycott is a blow to the U.N.'s first attempt in two years to bring representatives of President Bashar al-Assad's government and his opponents together for talks on ending the devastating five-year war.
 
The HNC, which wants itself to be the sole representative of the Syrian opposition to sit at the table across the Syrian regime, had met in Riyadh earlier on Jan. 28, to decide that the opposition group would not attend the negotiations in Geneva until an agreement is reached on aid entering besieged towns.

The committee was formed in December 2015 when the main Syrian political opposition and armed factions came together in the Saudi Arabian capital for an unprecedented bid at unity, after months of Saudi efforts.
Riyad Hijab, coordinator of the High Negotiations Committee, said aid access was a precondition of the group attending.

"Tomorrow we won't be in Geneva. We could go there, but we will not enter the...