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The Washington Post's Beirut Bureau Chief Liz Sly explains the powerplay at work in the Syrian civil war.

"It's actually very hard to imagine how things could get much more complicated," she told Â鶹Éç Radio 4's World at One.

After almost five years of civil war in Syria, more than 250,000 people have died, and more than 11 million people have been displaced.

Both Russia and the US have backed a limited ceasefire, due to begin on 19th February.

(Photo: Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov beside US Secretary of State John Kerry. Credit: AFP/Getty Images)