Syria envoy says Assad can't be part of new government

The international peace envoy for Syria said on Wednesday he did not see President Bashar Assad being part of a transitional government envisaged by a peace plan agreed by major powers last year.

"Surely he would not be a member of that government," Lakhdar Brahimi, the envoy, told Reuters in an interview in Cairo, in some of his clearest language yet on the future he sees for Assad. (Reuters)