MAARZAF, Syria (AP) – Just days into a U.S.-Russia-brokered cease-fire, many residents in a pro-government Syrian village long engulfed in fierce fighting in a central province expressed hope Wednesday that the truce will prevail and that a sense of normalcy could soon return.
But the cease-fire is partial and though as such it has mostly held across the war-wrecked nation, it excludes the Islamic State group as well as Syria’s al-Qaida branch, known as the Nusra Front, and other militant factions that the United Nations considers terrorist organizations.
In a stark reflection of those limitations, a car bomb killed 18 commanders of a U.S.-backed rebel group on Wednesday, a serious blow to the rebels, while Syrian Kurdish-led forces took strategic ground in Aleppo province from the Nusra Front, in a surprise offensive aimed at encircling the provincial capital.
Russia’s Defense Ministry, in a bid to secure the cease-fire, said it has set up a coordination center that includes several dozen officers who visit opposition groups and local communities to help negotiate local truce deals.
On a trip to central Syria organized by the Russian government Wednesday, an Associated Press team saw one such document being signed in the village of Maarzaf, about 15 kilometers (9 miles) west of the city of Hama, the provincial capital.