Russia works with US, rebels in Syria

Russian President Vladimir Putin poses for a selfie with young activists during National Unity Day celebrations in Moscow’s Red Square on Wednesday. — AFP

Moscow said Tuesday it worked with Opposition groups in its latest Syrian airstrikes while the US said its pilots communicated with Russian aircraft, in tentative signs the powers are working together to end the civil war ahead of UN talks.

Russian said its jets bombed 24 targets in Syria using coordinates supplied by “Opposition representatives”, the first time it has claimed to work with those fighting Syria’s regime since beginning its air offensive.

“The coordinates of all of these targets were given to us by Opposition representatives,” senior military official Andrei Kartapolov said, without specifying the groups involved.

Hours later the Pentagon said its fighter pilots communicated directly with Russian jets in the skies over Syria, in the first test of a new strategy to ensure the two sides’ parallel campaigns do not boil over into conflict between them.

Washington and Moscow signed an agreement on October 20 laying out rules keep their pilots away from each other in the air, after several close encounters raised the prospect of a mid-air collision or some other dangerous encounter.

The Syrian Army, meanwhile, regained control ofa road southeast of Aleppo on Wednesday, taking back the government's only supply route into the city from ISIS fighters who had seized it last month.

State TV said army forces took full control of the road which runs from Aleppo through the towns of Khanaser and Ithriya and links up with the cities of Hama and Homs further south. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group confirmed the report.

The road is the Army's supply route to government-held western parts of Aleppo, home to around 2 million people.

State TV rolled live footage of the road being reopened. Separately, Iran will not cooperate with the United States on the “fight against terrorists in Syria”, a top adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was quoted as saying on Wednesday.

“Iran will not cooperate directly or indirectly with the United States,” Ali Akbar Velayati was quoted as saying on Press TV after a meeting with Syrian deputy foreign minister Faisal Mekdad in Tehran.