Diplomats descend on Vienna to chart 'course out of hell' for Syria

Top-level officials began arriving in Vienna on Thursday morning for two days of historic talks on the war in Syria.

US Secretary of State, who headed to the Austrian capital on Wednesday night, said the negotiations had the tough task of charting “a course out of hell”.

Kerry will be joined later on Thursday by representatives of Saudi Arabia and Russia, countries that have backed opposing forces during more than four years of civil war.

For the first time since the outbreak of the war in 2011, Iranian diplomats will also join the international talks on Friday.

Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif is expected to arrive in Vienna on Thursday afternoon ahead of his participation in the negotiations.

Iran, a key backer of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad which is reported to have sent thousands of ground troops to reinforce the government’s struggling armed forces, has previously been blocked from attending talks about the conflict.

Opposition to Iran’s participation in the talks has come mainly from Saudi Arabia, which supports the Syrian opposition.

Ahead of the talks, Kerry struck a cautiously positive note, hailing the “ever broadening group of nations” taking part in the discussions.

“While finding a way forward on Syria will not be easy… it is the most promising opportunity for a political opening,” Kerry told an audience at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace on Wednesday.

Iran’s participation in the talks comes amid reports of rising death tolls for its fighters in Syria, and rare open dissent at home over its role in the conflict.

Reformist newspaper Bahar, which has faced multiple shutdowns in the past over its politically controversial content, questioned the government’s line on the conflict in an editorial published on Thursday morning.

“According to official statements, most Iranian soldiers are in Syria to provide military advice to the Syrian army. But we can see that most of the senior Iranian fighters who have died were killed on the frontlines in Aleppo.”

The paper predicted a swift end to the conflict as a result of the rising Iranian death toll.

Although Iran does not make public official statistics of its death toll, the deputy head of the Revolutionary Guard openly acknowledged this week that numbers are on the rise.

Also attending the discussions on Friday will be delegates from Iraq, Egypt, France and the European Union.

Jordan and the United Arab Emirates, members of a US-led coalition engaged in airstrikes targeting Islamic State group fighters, will join the talks.

However, a spokesperson for a key Syrian opposition group said his group had not received an invitation to Vienna.

“That didn’t happen,” Syrian National Coalition (SNC) spokesperson George Sabra said on Thursday, when asked if the group had been invited.

“This shows the lack of seriousness of the project… this project is for show, to exchange speeches and words, and nothing real can come out of it.”

In a statement on Wednesday, the SNC said that Iran's involvement in talks would undermine peace efforts and called on Tehran to withdraw its troops fighting alongside government forces.

As of 2012, the US, the UK and France as well as 14 other UN member states have said they recognise the SNC as the official representative of the Syrian people.