GENEVA — Kofi Annan, the special Syria representative from the United Nations and the Arab League whose paralyzed peace plan is in danger of collapse, said Wednesday that he would convene an “Action Group” meeting of influential countries in Geneva this Saturday in an effort to revive it.

But the announcement came only after Mr. Annan had made concessions over which countries would attend. Conspicuously absent from the list of invitees were Iran, the strongest regional ally of President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, and Saudi Arabia, a prominent supporter of Mr. Assad’s enemies.
The aim of the meeting is to “identify the steps and measures to secure full implementation” of Mr. Annan’s six-point plan and bring “an immediate cessation of violence in all forms,” Mr. Annan said in a statement released in Geneva. It will also seek to unite the international community behind proposals for a Syrian-led political transition “that meets the legitimate aspirations of the Syrian people,” he said.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey V. Lavrov will attend along with foreign ministers from other permanent Security Council members Britain, China and France. Also invited are emissaries from Turkey, Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar, the European Union, the Arab League as well as Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.
The compromise formula, diplomats in Geneva said, was to limit attendance from the Middle East to countries that held a position with the Arab League — Iraq as chair of the League’s summit, Kuwait as chair of its Council of Foreign Ministers and Qatar as chair of the League’s follow-up committee on Syria. Mr. Annan has criticized what he has called competing agendas among major powers in the Syrian conflict, undermining the international community’s ability to exert pressure on Mr. Assad or his adversaries to abide by a cease-fire. Mr. Annan has repeatedly warned that the conflict, which began as a peaceful Arab Spring opposition movement to President Assad in March 2011, is threatening to plunge Syria and neighboring countries into a sectarian conflagration.
Mrs. Clinton, who strongly objected to Iran’s inclusion in the meeting, said while traveling in Finland that she had “great hope” the meeting prove “a critical turning point.”
Critical to the outcome will be whether the United States and Russia can bridge their differences over Syria. The United States has demanded that President Assad step down. Russia, the main military supplier to Mr. Assad’s government, has rejected any solution in which political change in Syria is imposed by outside powers.
Mr. Annan’s peace plan includes a provision for a peaceful political transition in Syria. But the role, if any, that Mr. Assad would play in such a transition remains unclear.
Part of the purpose of the Action Group meeting, a Geneva-based diplomat said, speaking on condition of anonymity, was to de-link the process of achieving a cease-fire from the increasing demands that Mr. Assad’s government be held to account for rights abuses, which a United Nations panel said Wednesday have continued on “an alarming scale.”