Russia appealed Saturday for a political transition process in Syria, a day after UN-Arab League envoy Lakhdar Brahimi held tripartite talks in Geneva on ending the nearly two-year-old crisis.

"It is necessary to secure the launch of a political transition process in Syria aimed at enshrining in law guaranteed and equal rights of all ethnic-confessional groups of this country," the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

In line with the Geneva Communique agreed at the Action Group's meeting on June 30, 2012, Russia had "positively responded to the initiative of continuing consultations in this format," the statement said.

"At the same time, we are convinced that priority should be given to immediately stopping any violence and bloodshed and rendering humanitarian aid to the Syrians, including internally displaced persons and refugees," it said.

Russia remained "firmly convinced that Syria's future must be decided by the Syrians themselves, without any interference from outside and without the imposition of ready development recipes," the ministry said.

After the Geneva meeting, which drew together Brahimi, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov and U.S. Undersecretary of State William Burns, Bogdanov met a delegation of the Syrian opposition Democratic Forum, the Interfax reported.

The two sides discussed the situation and looked at the possibility of launching a broad national dialogue in accordance with the Geneva Communique.