In First, 2 Sides in Syria Talks Hold a Meeting Face to Face

GENEVA — The Syrian government and opposition held their first face-to-face meeting Saturday morning at the United Nations building here and were set to discuss a potential cease-fire in the afternoon, participants said, moving the fragile peace talks to a new stage after a bumpy beginning.

The opposing teams sat across from each other at a U-shaped table and made eye contact but did not speak, listening as Lakhdar Brahimi, the international mediator for Syria, spoke about the agenda for the talks, said Obeida Nahas, a member of the opposition delegation.

The session lasted about 30 minutes, and the delegations left through separate doors to avoid contact, planning to resume in the afternoon to discuss the first order of business: a potential cease-fire in the central Syrian city of Homs to allow aid deliveries to reach areas long blockaded by the government.

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Getting the two sides into the room required a prodigious effort by international mediators that lasted well into the early morning hours, even after Western diplomats had said the talks were ready to go, said Ibrahim Hamidi, a Syria correspondent for Al Hayat, a Saudi Arabian-owned newspaper, with longstanding contacts on both sides.

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He said the government delegation quibbled about the members of the opposition delegation. The Syrian foreign minister, Walid al-Moallem, had been insisting that the most senior member of the opposition team, Ahmad al-Jarba, attend the opening session to demonstrate seriousness and ensure that Mr. Moallem had an appropriately senior counterpart, Mr. Hamidi said.

But such skirmishes over protocol appear to illustrate that the talks have achieved one of their extraordinarily modest goals: to get the two sides to recognize each other to some degree.

At the same time, each side issued statements after the meeting that appeared intended to fend off criticism from their core supporters for attending.

SANA, the Syrian state news agency, said the first session had taken place between the government and the “so-called coalition delegation,” quoting Syria’s ambassador to the United Nations, Bashar al-Jaafari, as saying, “The so-called opposition attended after changing its formation, which is new evidence of its confusion and dependency” on foreign powers.

A coalition negotiatior, Anas al-Abdeh, told The Associated Press that it had been hard to “sit with the killers.” The main obstacle to getting the sides together has been disagreement over the protocols for the meeting, based on a previous conference called Geneva 1, which ask for the establishment of a transitional governing body “by mutual consent.”

The government has rejected any proposal that would mean the departure of President Bashar al-Assad, while the opposition says it cannot entertain the idea of his staying in power.

The meeting went forward, Mr. Nahas said, because on Friday the government delegation gave an oral commitment to Mr. Brahimi that it accepted the Geneva 1 protocols.

Another opposition member, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the group had decided to compromise and accept an oral commitment rather than a written one because it wanted the talks to begin.

None of the most senior members of the government delegation attended. Syria’s deputy foreign minister, Fayssal Mekdad, was seen entering the building, but Louay Safi, a spokesman for the opposition coalition, said neither Mr. Mekdad nor Mr. Moallem had taken part. Neither had the information minister nor a top adviser to President Assad, Bouthaina Shaaban.

Mr. Jarba, the president of the main exile opposition group, the National Coalition of Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces, had said earlier that he would not attend, sending a chief negotiator in his place.

“Today, we shall start with modest ideas, and we will build on them to achieve something,” Mr. Mekdad told reporters ahead of the meeting. “We move gradually to bigger and bigger issues.”

Hala Droubi and Hwaida Saad contributed reporting.