DHAKA: The UN mediator in the Syrian conflict, Staffan de Mistura, has told the BBC he believes there is a fresh opportunity to resolve the country’s crisis.

He said truce measures could succeed because of the common threat from Islamic State (IS) militants, as well as a growing weariness with conflict.

The UN has called for ‘freeze zones’ to halt fighting and improve aid.

More than 200,000 people have died in Syria’s increasingly fragmented civil war, now in its fourth year.

Rebel groups such as IS and the al-Qaeda-aligned Nusra Front have been fighting among themselves, as well as against forces loyal to president Bashar al-Assad.

Syria’s conflict has broadened this year, with a US-led coalition now carrying out air strikes against IS fighters and positions.

Speaking to the BBC’s Lyse Doucet in the war-torn Syrian city of Homs, de Mistura said the rise of IS was ‘a new factor which can turn into the possibility of looking at this conflict in a different way’.

BDST: 1602 HRS, NOV 11, 2014