Cessation of Hostilities' in Syria

DESPITE the many questions swirling around the 'cessation of hostilities', brokered by the US and Russia and backed by the UN Security Council, in Syria including whether a truce will eventually take hold, the plan offers a glimmer of hope. The development in the five-year-old war, that has seen more than a quarter of a million people killed, many more injured and millions displaced, could forestall a looming humanitarian crisis for a half million Syrians at risk of going hungry. And a truce allowing aid in besieged pockets of the country could put off a second wave of refugees to spill into Turkey and on to Europe.

Still some way from a formal ceasefire, this may be the most realistic outcome diplomats were able to secure given the complexity of the Syrian conflict. Simply put, the focus is now on allowing humanitarian access to war ravaged cities and creating conditions for further negotiations to take place without the persistence of war that has ground to a stalemate, with the Assad regime, IS, an array of rebels and Kurdish fighters at each other's throat for years.

Time has come for Moscow and Tehran who, have bolstered the Assad regime, and the West, Turkey and some Gulf States, who back the rebel groups, to come to the realisation that the status quo is untenable for much longer. Peace can only be achieved by understanding among all stakeholders, not by outside force.  

The international community, building on the pause to the bloodshed, should now exhaust all options to carve out a more formal ceasefire agreement.