A ceasefire brokered by Russia and the United States took effect in Syria at sundown yesterday, despite scepticism over how long the truce in the five-year conflict would hold.
 The initial 48-hour truce came into force at 7pm local time (1600 GMT) across Syria except in areas held by militants like the Islamic State group.
 AFP correspondents in Syria’s devastated second city Aleppo, divided between a rebel-held east and regime-controlled west since mid-2012, said fighting appeared to have stopped as the ceasefire took effect.
 The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said it was “quiet” on nearly all fronts.
 Syria’s armed forces  announced a seven-day “freeze” on military operations, but opposition forces have yet to formally sign on.
 The deal’s fragility was underscored just hours before sundown when President Bashar al-Assad vowed to retake the whole country from opposition groups.
 The agreement, announced on Friday after marathon talks between Russia and the US, has been billed as the best chance yet to halt Syria’s five-year war, which has left 290,000 people dead.
 Under the deal, fighting will halt across areas not held by militants and aid deliveries to besieged areas will begin, with government and rebel forces ensuring unimpeded humanitarian access to Aleppo in particular.
 The ceasefire will be renewed every 48 hours and, if it holds for a week, Moscow and Washington will begin unprecedented joint targeting of militant forces.
 Many in the Pentagon are deeply uneasy about the proposed collaboration, with one defence official saying “the proof will be in the pudding”.
 Senior Russian military official Sergei Rudskoi said the “cessation of hostilities is being resumed across all the territory of Syria”.
 But Moscow would “continue to carry out strikes against terrorist targets”, he said.
 Russia’s deputy foreign minister, Mikhail Bogdanov, told state-run media that UN special envoy Staffan de Mistura could be inviting parties to new peace talks “at the very beginning of October”.