World

WASHINGTON: Iranian Foreign Minister Ali-Akbar Salehi has warned that an abrupt political change in conflict-ridden Syria without a roadmap for managed political transition will lead to destabilisation in one of the world's most sensitive regions.

Salehi made the comment in an article in The Washington Post, just as his country started an international consultative meeting on Syria under the banner of "Stop Violence, National Dialogue", Xinhua reported.

"Abrupt political change without a roadmap for managed political transition will lead only to a precarious situation that would destabilise one of the world's most sensitive regions," Salehi wrote, recalling civil war in the Levant, including the 15- year Lebanese civil war, as "frightening lessons".

"Some world powers and certain states in the region need to stop using Syria as a battleground for settling scores or jostling for influence," he remarked, noting. "The only way out of the stalemate is to offer Syrians a chance to find a way out themselves."

Declaring Iran "part of the solution, not the problem," the minister noted that the consultative meeting of over 20 like-minded countries in Tehran Thursday aimed at three essential points -- ensuring an immediate ceasefire to stop the bloodshed, dispatching humanitarian aid to the Syrian people and preparing the ground for dialogue to solve the crisis, an echo of the six- point peace plan envisaged by Kofi Annan, the UN-Arab League joint envoy for Syria.

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