The UN envoy to Syria, Lakhdar Brahimi, is to return to the region this week in a bid to revive international mediation efforts aimed at ending the country's deadly civil war, officials said.
Jan Eliasson, deputy to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, said he did not know if Brahimi would be able to enter Syria, but hoped to persuade Bashar al-Assad's government to "go in the direction of a reduction of violence."
Progress is far from certain but if the government did reduce attacks, Eliasson said, it would be "followed by a reduction of violence on the other side."
"There are two ways it could go now: one is an escalation of hostilities with the belief by both sides that a military solution is possible," the deputy secretary general said.
"One would hope there could be a possibility of a reduction of violence and a ceasefire in the best of cases, that would enhance the chances to have political movement."
Meanwhile, in Syria the army rained shells on rebel bastions in and around Damascus and sent extra troops to the country's second city Aleppo.
Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem said a political solution was still possible if the West and Gulf states halted support for the rebels.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the death toll from the 18-month conflict now exceeds 31,000.
"Brahimi will work from Cairo from next week onward, so that he is in the proximity of the region and can work very closely with Egyptian colleagues," Eliasson added.
Source: AFP