Assad-ally Iran wants Saudi Arabia excluded from Syria talks

Iran's defence minister has said Saudi Arabia should be excluded from the Syrian peace process, as a countrywide ceasefire could be implemented before the start of the New Year.

Hossein Dehghan said on Tuesday that Saudi insistence that President Bashar al-Assad should step down meant Riyadh should not participate in future peace talks.

"They [Saudi Arabia] are seeking to topple the existing regime. No talks should be allowed with those who are eager to do it. we must give them a decisive answer," Dehghan said in an interview with RT television.

The defence minister also said that rebel groups classified as terrorist organisations such as the former al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, previously known as the Nusra Front, received funding from Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United States.

Shia-majority Iran and Sunni-majority Saudi Arabia have no diplomatic relations and support opposite sides in wars in Syria and Yemen.

Riyadh has backed rebel groups and long insisted that a political settlement must include Assad agreeing to step down.

Turkey and Russia are planning to implement a countrywide ceasefire in Syria before the start of the New Year, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Thursday.

The ceasefire could be put in place "at any moment", the minister told A Haber television after reports a day earlier that Turkey and Russia had agreed on a deal.

Sources told Reuters on Wednesday that Assad would remain in power for at least a few years under the deal.

They said Russia and Turkey would allow Assad to remain until the next elections when he would quit in favour of a less polarising candidate from the Alawite sect of Shia Islam.

Several rebel groups have said they are withholding from agreeing to the ceasefire until they receive full details of its terms.

Last week, Russia, Iran and Turkey issued a joint declaration backing renewed peace efforts, following the Syrian regime's capture of rebel-held eastern Aleppo.

An earlier ceasefire effort in September, brokered by the US and Russia, quickly disintegrated as Damascus continued its bombing of opposition-held areas.