Russia will not pressure Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad to step down, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told the BBC during an interview on Friday.
"Russia is not in the regime-change game, and there is absolutely no chance of Moscow telling Al-Assad to stand down", he said.

Lavrov stated that Moscow is against "interference in domestic conflicts,” pointing out that Al-Assad himself has no intention of resigning.

"I can only say it is not for us to decide who should lead Syria. It is for the Syrians to decide", Lavrov reiterated.

Russia and China, Al-Assad's staunchest international allies, vetoed three UN Security Council resolutions last year threatening sanctions against the Syrian regime. The latest Russia-China veto deepened an acrimonious battle at the Security Council over who is to blame for the world powers' failure to get international action to halt the two-year Syrian conflict.

Lavrov said in December that Russia was pressing the Syrian leadership to act on previous pledges for dialogue with the opposition.
However, the head of Russia's arms exports agency told Reuters on 13 February that Moscow is still delivering military hardware to Al-Assad's regime, including air defence systems.

"We are continuing to fulfil our obligations on contracts for the delivery of military hardware," Rosoboron export chief Anatoly Isaikin said, quoted by the Interfax news agency. He said the deliveries included anti-missile air defence systems and repair equipment but not attack weapons or aircraft.

US, Russia differ on Syria

US Secretary of State John Kerry began talks with Lavrov last week aimed at bridging differences over Syria after voicing confidence the two could find "common ground" despite different opinions on the 23-month civil war.

Hours ahead of his talks with Kerry, Lavrov had slammed "extremists" within the Syrian opposition who he said were blocking the start of dialogue in the war-torn country by making unrealistic demands.

He said that recent faint hopes that dialogue was possible between the opposition and the Assad regime had dissipated.

"It seems that extremists who bet on an armed solution to the Syrian problem have prevailed in the ranks of the opposition at this time, including the so-called (Syrian) National Coalition, blocking all initiatives that could lead to the start of dialogue," AFP quoted Lavrov in Moscow as saying.

Lavrov said there was "an increasing understanding of the need to influence both the government and especially the opposition in order to persuade them against putting forward unrealistic demands as the prerequisite conditions for the start of dialogue".

"During our latest phone contact it seemed to me that he (John Kerry) understands the acuteness of the situation," he added.

Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallem had told Moscow that the authorities in Damascus were ready to talk to armed rebels, the first time a senior official of the Assad regime had made such a proposal.

But the rebel Free Syrian Army's chief of staff Selim Idriss said that before any dialogue could begin, Assad's regime must fall, among other pre-conditions.
Washington has recently toned down its criticism of Moscow's intransigence over Syria.

"We've been absolutely clear that there needs to be a political transition, and we felt that Russia could play a key role in convincing the regime... that there needs to be that political transition," a State Department official told reporters.

However the talks are not expected to produce a "big breakthrough", the official added.