Syria's President Bashar al-Assad agrees to talks, says Russia

Syria's President Bashar al-Assad has agreed "in principle" to send representatives to a peace conference aimed at ending his country's civil war, his Russian backers said.

The declaration followed talks hosted by Moscow with the Syrian deputy foreign minister, Faisal al-Mokdad. Russia has been determined to prevent America and its Western allies forcing a solution to the Syrian crisis that ignores Moscow's historic backing for the Assad regime. But it has also come under intense pressure from the Arab world, which is largely hostile to Mr Assad, to force him into a compromise.

The Syrian opposition National Coalition is also meeting to discuss whether to take part in the conference, which is backed by America and Russia and is known as "Geneva 2". It will attempt to revive the Geneva plan for a transition of power that was agreed at the beginning of 2012 but rejected by the regime.

The opposition has been badly split by arguments between its Islamist and non-Islamist factions, as well as over whether to take part at all. Moaz al-Khatib, the Damascus cleric who was its leader until he resigned last month, put forward his own initiative involving negotiations with the regime and leading to the transfer of authority to a transitional government.

But this was dismissed by another senior figure as "heading for the dustbin of history" yesterday, apparently because it promises Mr Assad and regime figures immunity from prosecution and the chance of exile if they agree to step aside. Meanwhile, Mr Assad is refusing to consider any alternative to his continued rule.

Britain and America have stopped referring to their previous demands that Mr Assad must go at the start of any transition, but that is still expected by the opposition, which until now has refused even to negotiate with the regime. Regime forces and fighters from the Lebanese Shia militia Hizbollah continued their battle to recapture the city of Qusayr near the Lebanese border yesterday. The fighting has also spilled over into the nearby northern Lebanese city of Tripoli, where clashes between Sunni and Shia groups have killed 25 people in the past week.