WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The ceasefire deal brokered last September by Kerry and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov required the United States to facilitate the separation of the so-called moderate Syrian rebels from terror groups like al-Nusra Front.
"That ceasefire required a period of calm and five days into it, we accidentally bombed 70 Syrian troops and the Russians believed that we weren’t serious, that we were actually harboring Nusra [Front] that we weren’t willing to separate [them]. And then on the weekend the humanitarian truck got bombed and the thing fell apart."
Following the strike, Moscow insisted on an investigation into the incident. Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova stressed the importance of a probe to determine if the strike was an accident or a deliberate action in support of forces opposing Syrian President Bashar Assad.
On November 11, the Pentagon released a report which claimed that the US-led coalition's forces struck the Syrian army in Deir ez-Zor as a result of an "unintentional, regrettable error."