Syria's Foreign Minister Walid Muallim dismissed as politically motivated last week's press disclosures, attributed to unnamed diplomats linked to the UN watchdog.
With both the Syrian Foreign Minister, Walid al-Muallim, and Mr Khatib himself at that time about to go to Moscow, his opposition colleagues clearly feared - and the Russians hoped - that he might somehow get drawn into a dialogue of some sort with Damascus, with no knowing where it might lead.