Russia: US against Iran's participation in Geneva II conference

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennadiy Gatilov said Tuesday the United States did not agree to Iran's participating in the second international conference on Syria in Geneva. During the recent trilateral talks, Russia tried convince the US side of the necessity of participation of Iran as an important regional player who has influence on the incidents in Syria, but in vain, Interfax news agency quoted Gatilov as saying. He was referring to the talks that gathered representatives of Russia and US, and the UN-Arab League Joint Special Representative to Syria Lakhdar Brahimi in Geneva. He noted that the US is unable to convince the Syrian opposition of taking part in the conference. Gatilov added that the trilateral talks will be resumed on November 25. Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov has recently underscored the necessity of involving Iran and other neighbors of Syria as well as the Gulf countries in the planned conference