Comment: Must not be too secret of a clause to trigger the battles.
The clause calls for bolstering the positions controlled by the Syrian government and opposition forces during the ceasefire, but allows advances at the expense of ISIL and Fatah al-Sham Front, Al Bawaba reported.
Informed Syrian sources told Asharq Al-Awsat that the clause "bolsters the ceasefire reached in Syria and reinforces the positions of parties involved in the conflict, including Syrian government forces and their allies from one part and the opposition forces from another part."
However, it made an exception by allowing advancement at the expense of Fatah al-Sham and ISIL, two factions not included in the ceasefire agreement.
"Therefore, taking positions controlled by the two terror groups would be considered legitimate," the sources said.
The sources added that this unannounced clause reached in the Astana agreement had triggered a race between opposition factions and government forces on annexing Fatah al-Sham Front controlled areas.
"This clause transformed the positions held by al-Nusra into a cake that government forces and opposition factions are trying to annex with an attempt to boost their geographic powers," the sources added.
Therefore, the talks between opposition factions and the Syrian government in the Kazakh capital, Astana, approved the emergence of a Syrian military movement with the mission of crashing Fatah al-Sham Front in Syria.
Last week, Fatah al-Sham Front militants kicked off a new campaign against a number of 'moderate factions' in the North of Syria, a development that pushed those opposition forces to join hands against the terrorist group.
That allowed Ahrar al-Sham, Sukour al-Sham, Jaysh al-Islam and Fastaqim group to advance towards the areas in Northern Idlib and the West of Aleppo province to stop the attack launched by Fatah al-Sham Front against Jaysh al-Mujahiddeen, several opposition networks reported.
Sham network said on Tuesday that armed confrontations emerged between Fatah al-Sham and other opposition factions in several towns and villages in the Jabal al-Zawiya.
On Tuesday, a Russian-Turkish-Iranian agreement emerged from the Astana international meeting to bolster the shaky truce in Syria after two days of talks.
The agreement stipulates the creation of a trilateral mechanism to observe the ceasefire, without the ability of guaranteeing the endurance of the truce, reached last December in Ankara. The agreement also comes as the representative of the Syrian regime in Astana asserted his country would continue its military operations in the Barada Valley "as long as Damascus is deprived from water."
Moscow, Tehran and Ankara also agreed armed groups should take part in a new round of peace talks brokered by the UN in Geneva next month.
"There is no military solution to the Syrian conflict and... it can only be solved through a political process," said the closing statement issued by Russia, Iran and Turkey.
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