[Regnum] Syria has agreed to deploy UN peacekeeping forces in the buffer zone on the Golan Heights near the border with Israel, the head of the country's new administration, Ahmad al-Sharaa, said on January 16, Al-Jazeera reports.
"We are ready to accept UN forces in the buffer zone so that the situation returns to the state that existed before the Israeli advance," al-Sharaa said during talks with a Qatari delegation in Damascus.
He added that Israel no longer has arguments for advancing deeper into the buffer zone.
As reported by Regnum news agency, in early December the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) began deploying troops in the buffer zone on the Golan Heights near the border with Syria.
The IDF has previously tightened restrictions in towns near the Syrian border. Schools were cancelled in four Druze villages, farmers were banned from cultivating fields in the area, and checkpoints were set up in the Golan Heights. The Times of Israel reported that the IDF intends to declare the state's border areas with Syria a "closed military zone."
Russia expects that the agreement between Israel and the Palestinian movement Hamas on a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip will create conditions for sustainable stabilization of the situation in the region, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said earlier.