Kerry: No Syria peace talks before Sept.

Secretary of State John Kerry on Tuesday said that a last-ditch effort to host peace talks to end the Syrian civil war will likely not happen until September at the earliest, after a meeting with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov.

Kerry had initially hoped to hold the peace conference between Syrian President Bashar Assad’s regime and opposition forces in late May, but disagreements over who would participate and division between the United States and Russia on whether to invite bogged down preparations. 

{mosads}“We both agreed that that conference should happen sooner rather than later,” Kerry told reporters after meeting with Lavrov in Brunei.

“Though we have a … meeting between Russia and the United States in July, and obviously August is very difficult for Europeans and for others, so it may be somewhere thereafter, but that’s being talked about,” he added.

A number of European governments virtually shut down during August, adding to the difficulty of organizing an international conference under the auspices of the United Nations in Geneva.

Kerry’s announcement comes as the death toll in the two-year civil war topped 100,000 according to human rights groups. Rebel forces that have sought the ouster of Assad’s government have also faced a number of battlefield setbacks, losing territory to the regime, leading to calls for more U.S. aid.

Kerry sought to strike an optimistic note, saying his meeting with Lavrov was “constructive” and that both countries have a “solid” commitment to making the talks happen, regardless of the shifting military situation on the ground.

“Geneva … calls for a transitional government with a neutral environment, by mutual consent, with the full transfer of power,” Kerry said. “Whether the Assad regime is doing better or whether the opposition is doing better is frankly not determinative of that outcome because the outcome requires a transition government. And that’s why it is valuable to try to get to Geneva.”