SYRIAN peace talks will begin no later than Monday, a spokeswoman for United Nations special envoy Staffan de Mistura said yesterday.

Jessy Chahine added that the participants would be the same as those invited to a proposed first round of negotiations last month that never got off the ground.

The Saudi-based High Negotiations Committee (HNC), an alliance of various fundamentalist and sectarian forces, refused to enter negotiations until President Bashar al-Assad’s government called a unilateral ceasefire.