The UN's special envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, announced on Wednesday that he is stepping down.

The Italian-Swedish diplomat, who took on the role in 2014, will quit at the end of November, he told the UN Security Council in New York.

De Mistura has overseen numerous rounds of negotiations to try to bring the warring parties together and end the conflict in Syria, which is still raging in parts of the country after erupting in 2011.