The Geneva negotiations over settlement of the Syrian conflict have been suspended until February 25, 2016, reports RIA Novosti, citing UN Special Delegate for Syria Stafan de Misturay, according to “Armenpress”.

De Mistura mentioned that the reason why the negotiations were suspended was because the parties were focused on discussing procedural issues, not the solution to the humanitarian problems of the Syrian people. In the meantime, de Mistura denied the assumption that the complications could have been linked to the ongoing military operations in Syria.

“Those issues weren’t discussed,” he mentioned. As de Mistura said, the participants of the negotiations need to make a lot of effort. “After the first week of preparations for the negotiations, there is still a lot of work that needs to be done not only on our part, but also on the part of the interested parties,” the diplomat declared.

As reports Reuters, head of the Syrian governmental delegation Bashar Jaafari has noted that the negotiations were suspended because of the opposition’s intention to stop participating in them. Jaafari claims that the authorities of Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey had instructed them to do that.