Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif meets with his Jordanian counterpart Nasser Judeh in Amman, Jordan, Tuesday, Jan. 14, 2014. Zarif visits Jordan as part of his regional tour of the Middle East countries including Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar and United Arab Emirates. (AP Photo/Mohammad Hannon, Pool)
DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) — Syrian President Bashar Assad and Iran’s visiting foreign minister have held talks about next week’s United Nations conference aimed at trying to resolve the three-year deadly conflict.
Iran is Assad’s strongest regional ally and is believed to have given the Syrian government weapons and billions of dollars since the crisis began in March 2011.
State television says Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif expressed Tehran’s support for Assad’s government to make the conference successful.
Zarif’s visit comes ahead of the Jan. 22 conference in Montreux, Switzerland.
The U.N., which is hosting the talks, has not yet invited Iran to attend, although a final decision had yet to be made.
However, the prospects for success at the talks appear slim at best.
