MOSCOW (Dispatches) – Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Monday a U.S. refusal to take part in the reconstruction of Syria was designed to impede the return of Syrian refugees to the country.
Lavrov said Washington was only interested in rebuilding parts of Syria where the opposition to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was active. Lavrov was speaking in Moscow following talks with his Lebanese counterpart Gebran Bassil.
Acting U.S. Assistant Secretary David Satterfield has said the United States and other countries would not contribute to Syria’s full reconstruction until there was a "credible and irreversible” political process underway to end the conflict.
Lavrov said Russia will help Lebanon return refugees to neighboring Syria and called on opposition groups in the terrorist-held Syrian province of Idlib to distance themselves from the Nusra Front group, formerly the local branch of al-Qaeda.
The province was hit by a wave of air strikes and shelling earlier this month, in a possible prelude to a government offensive to regain control.
"We agreed that Lebanon should not be the subject to foreign interference, a pawn in geopolitical games, or a hostage of the Syrian crisis and its negative consequences such as the problem of Syrian refugees,” Lavrov said after talks with his visiting Lebanese counterpart, Gebran Bassil.
According to the UN’s refugee agency, nearly 5.5 million Syrians have fled abroad to escape the country’s war.
Lebanon hosts more than 1 million Syrian refugees, equal to more than a quarter of its population, and Bassil told reporters Beirut saw no reason for refugees to remain on its territory.
On Idlib, Lavrov said Russia wanted militants to separate themselves from groups Moscow regards as extremists.
Idlib in northern Syria is part of the last significant terrorist-held area in Syria and Assad, who is backed by Moscow, has said his forces will recapture the region.

Displaced people who fled the Syrian war sit on their belongings near the Lebanese-Syrian border as they prepare to return to their village of Beit Jinn in Syria, while Lebanese General Security soldiers stand guard, in the southern village of Shebaa, Lebanon, April, 18, 2018.