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| Premier Erdogan and Turkey's top brass (top) and a march by Syrian Kurds |
Syria is coming apart at the seams.
Having lost Syria, President Bashar al-Assad and his
Shiite allies from Iran, Iraq and Hezbollah are waging a campaign of sectarian cleansing
in order to carve out a rump state along the Mediterranean coast.
With its capital in
Latakia, it would reflect the geographical contours of the traditional Alawite
heartland.
At the same time, Syria’s
Kurds are now fighting for an autonomous Syrian Kurdistan in their portion of
the country bordering Turkey, with its putative capital in Qamishli.
The breakup of Syria
into three enclaves for Kurds, Shiite Alawites and Sunnis mirrors the gradual dismemberment
of Iraq after the 2003 U.S. invasion.
The
northern province of Iraqi Kurdistan is today an independent country in all but
name, while Sunni and Shiite Iraqis are more likely to splinter into distinct
entities than remain part of a cohesive nation-state.
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| Image by Daniel Sitts |
An autonomous Kurdish enclave
in northern Syria is the second piece in a four-part puzzle of a “Kurdistan
country.” A 1983 map by the Financial
Times shows a big Kurdish country separated into four pieces -- one in
northern Iraq (which is in place), one in northeastern Syria (which is in the
making), one in Iran and the last in Turkey’s southeast.
Turkish authorities --
already apprehensive about Syrian Kurdish militants' recent strengthening along
Turkey's borders -- are further alarmed over reports that the Democratic Union
Party (PYD), an offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), is preparing to
declare autonomy in northeastern Syria.
There is now talk of
DYP leader Salih Muslim Muhammad
announcing shortly a nine-member government to run the would-be enclave.
Turkish Deputy Prime
Minister Bülent Arınç said the move would undermine Syria’s territorial
integrity and pose a security threat to Turkey.
Speaking at a press
conference after a cabinet meeting in Ankara on Monday, Arınç called efforts by
the PYD to declare autonomy in northeastern Syria “irksome.”
Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu
reiterated yesterday Ankara would not accept de facto autonomous regions in
Syria before the country elects a legitimate national parliament.
He told reporters in
Warsaw, "This does not mean Turkey is against the rights of any group in
Syria, chiefly Kurds... So, this is not a position against our Kurdish brothers
[in Syria]… We are concerned any de facto move could further deepen the crisis
in Syria."
"With regards our
security and the security of our border districts, villages and towns as well
as Syria's future, we want everyone to avoid conflict pending a new democratic regime
in Syria," Davutoglu said.
Turkey’s Yeni Şafak
daily said last week Assad endorsed plans for an autonomous Syrian Kurdistan in
a recent meeting with PYD representatives.
He reportedly agreed to
recognize the autonomy of Kurds in an area covering al-Hasakah,
Ras
al-Ayn, Afreen, Ayn al-Arab and Qamishli.
If so, the move might
force Turkey’s hand, according to Dr. Ghassan Shabaneh, a Mellon Fellow in Human
Security at the Ralph Bunche Institute for International Relations at the CUNY
Graduate Center, and an Associate Professor of Middle East and International
Studies at Marymount Manhattan College in NYC.
Shabaneh told Aljazeera TV earlier this week Turkey would most probably have no
choice then other than to set up safe havens or a security zone in Syria’s
Kurdish areas.
Israel held a 4-to-12-kilometer-deep
South Lebanon Security Zone from 1985 to 1999.
Turkish political
analyst, columnist and commentator on A9 TV Aylin
Kokaman says Turkey is now facing the PKK threat it braved 30 years
ago.
An autonomous Syrian
Kurdish enclave is tantamount to “a declaration of war on Turkey,” she writes today for the leading Saudi
daily Asharq Alawsat.
Ms Kokaman says Ankara
will have no option but to use its armed forces to protect Turkey’s national
unity and territorial integrity, with or without American and European backing.
