Russia will not participate in a meeting of Friends of the so-called Syria Group in Tunisia, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said on Tuesday.

Last week during an emergency meeting of the Arab League Council at the level of Foreign Ministers, Tunisia initiated the first international conference Friends of Syria. Earlier the Arabic newspaper Al Sharq Al Awsat, citing a statement by Tunisian Foreign Minister Rafik Abdesselam, reported that Russia would participate in the event.

...  Lukashevich said that according to the report, "it seems that we are talking about slapping together some kind of international coalition as was the case in organizing the Libya Contact Group in order to support one side against the other in an internal conflict."

The Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement that "Russia is for all members of the world community to act as friends of all Syrian people and not only part of it."