Government officials and rebels have reached a deal to ease a weeks-long blockade on a rebel-held town near the Syrian capital, allowing food to reach civilians there for the first time in weeks, activists said.
The truce is the latest to be struck in recent months between President Bashar Assad’s government and disparate rebel groups in the country’s conflict.
It comes as the main western-backed Syrian opposition group was holding the second of two days of meetings in Istanbul to decide whether to attend a proposed peace conference the US and Russia are trying to convene in Geneva by the end of this year.
The Syrian National Coalition has demanded Mr Assad step down in any transitional government as a condition for participation in the talks.
Syrian officials say Mr Assad will stay in his post at least until his term ends in 2014.
According to a draft statement that the coalition officials say the group intends to vote on, the opposition in exile affirms its “readiness” to take part in a transitional government.
It also called for goodwill measures from the Assad government, including lifting sieges on rebel-held areas. It wasn’t clear whether the deal in Qudsaya was such a gesture, as neither rebels nor Syrian officials comment on such deals.
Rami Abdurrahman of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the deal allowed food and flour to enter the town on the outskirts of Damascus, under blockade since October.