Trump could allow Assad to stay on as president until 2021

President Donald Trump could accept Bashar al-Assad staying in power until 2021, sources told a US media outlet this week, marking a major U-turn in Washington's Syria policy.

US administrations over the past six years have insisted that any peace deal should include a condition that Assad step down as president.

According to a The New Yorker report on Monday US and European sources say that Trump could allow the man responsible for half a million deaths to stay on as Syria's leader for at least the next three years.

The decision could allow for the quick end to the war, but such a settlement would undoubtedly lead to future unrest.

Trump has previously said he might depart from his predecessor President Barack Obama's policy of removing Assad from the picture of a future Syria.

Allowing Assad to stay on until planned elections in 2021 could be enough to draw the reluctant regime into peace talks, who have for years blocked negotiations with the opposition that might result in the president relinquishing power.

It would infuriate the opposition who have complained of years of US diplomatic and military inactivity during the six-year war, which allowed Assad to bring in foreign backers to bolster his position and intensify his attacks on civilian areas.

Analysts say that the current situation grants the opposition little room to manoeuvre. Rebel fighters have lost most of the key strategic ground in Syria, Russia appears confident that Assad has won the war, while even the opposition's key foreign backers appear keen on ending the war.

Putin's visit to a Russian airbase in Syria on Monday showed that despite Moscow's announcement it was withdrawing troops from the war-torn country its military presence there was irreversable. 

Russia has been keen to push through a peace deal favourable to Assad and warned the rebels it was ready to strike and crush any future anti-regime insurgency.