UN envoy declares start of Syria peace talks

The UN envoy for Syria on Monday declared the official start of peace negotiations in Switzerland aimed at charting a way out of the brutal and tangled civil war that has killed more than 260,000 people. Speaking after his first formal meeting in Geneva with the main opposition grouping, Staffan de Mistura said that indirect talks between the government and the opposition are now "starting officially". The main opposition High Negotiations Committee (HNC), here since late Saturday, had been relu