Ban calls for ceasefire in Syria during Ramadan

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has called on all parties in the Syria conflict to put down arms during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Ban said in a statement on Monday that Ramadan is among four months during which fighting is supposed to stop. The holy month will start in Syria on Wednesday.

“For the sake of the Syrian people, therefore, I would like to call on all parties in Syria to respect this religious obligation for at least, at a minimum, one month,” Ban said.

“I am calling for every military unit of the regular army and the Free Syrian Army, for every person holding a gun, to stop fighting and offer this month of peace as a collective present to their people – and to do so across Syria,” he also said.

This came as the foreign-backed Syria opposition, the so-called Syrian National Coalition (SNC), said on Sunday that it was going to receive advanced weapons from the Saudi Arabia in their fight against the Syrian government.

At a joint press conference in Moscow, on May 7, the Russian foreign minister and US Secretary of State John Kerry agreed to encourage the Syrian government and the foreign-backed militants to find a political solution to the crisis.

Moscow and Washington also agreed to hold an international ‘peace conference’ on Syria in Geneva, which will serve as a follow-up to an earlier Geneva meeting in June 2012.

Unrest has gripped Syria for over two years, and many people, including large numbers of Syrian soldiers and security personnel, have been killed in the foreign-sponsored militancy.