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| The PYD's Saleh Muslim and a map showing "Rojava" along Syria's border with Turkay |
Syrian Kurds yesterday
declared an interim administration in northeastern parts of the country
(Rojava), further solidifying their geographic and political presence after
driving out radical Islamist rebels.
Long oppressed under
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his father before him, Kurds view the
Syria war as an opportunity to gain more autonomy -- like their ethnic kin in
neighboring Iraq.
Control over Syria's
northeast, where Kurds predominate, had in recent months swung back and forth
between them and mainly Arab Islamist rebels, who strongly oppose what they
suspect are Kurdish plans to secede.
But a Kurdish militia
prevailed earlier this month, and at a meeting held in the Syrian city of
Qamishli yesterday, a committee of Kurdish and other groups said it was now
time to set up an administrative body to run the region.
"In light of the
current circumstances which Syria is going through, and in order to fill an
administrative vacuum... we see it as an utmost necessity to reach a
transitional, pluralistic, democratic administration," said a statement
sent to Reuters.
The statement said they
were committed to the unity of Syria and asked world powers and neighboring
countries to back the new administration, which they said had won the support
of different political groups and minorities in the area.
The dominant force on
the ground in Syria's Kurdish areas is the Democratic Union Party (PYD), which
has a well-trained militia and is affiliated with the outlawed Kurdistan
Workers' Party (PKK).
The PYD's growing clout
has also dismayed some fellow Kurds, who accuse it of being in league with
Assad and seeking to replace his authoritarian one-party rule with its own.
PYD representative
Mohammed Reso said some Syrian Kurdish parties had refused to sign up to the
plan.
Davutoglu
In his first remarks
after the declaration of the interim administration, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet
Davutoglu accused the PYD of "not keeping its promise."
"We told them to
avoid a de facto administration declaration that could divide Syria. We told
them to put a distance between themselves and the [al-Assad] regime,"
Davutoglu said during a live interview on private broadcaster NTV on Tuesday.
He criticized the
Kurdish group for adopting an "ambivalent" posture. "The most
serious mistake that the PYD is making is to put under pressure on the other
Kurdish opposition groups in [their] controlled areas. We receive a lot of
complaints from Kurds [in northern Syria], and we hope they will change this
attitude," Davutoglu added.
PYD leader
Saleh Muslim had visited Turkey twice in a brief period in July and August
as the open conflict between Kurdish militia groups and jihadist rebels
mounted, causing a refugee outflow from Rojava. He reportedly discussed with
Turkish officials PYD's plans of forming an autonomous administration that
triggered concerns in Ankara.
Barzani
The Turkish government
and Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) have adopted a
similar attitude on the situation in northern Syria. Both oppose the PYD's
creation of a politically autonomous entity in the region.
KRG leader Massoud
Barzani is troubled by the disputes among Kurds, particularly between the PYD
and other Kurdish parties, over the areas in Syria's north.
The Turkish government
and Barzani also backed the Syrian Kurdish National Council (KNC), a group that
agreed to join the main Syrian opposition body, the Syrian National Coalition
of Revolutionary and Opposition Forces.
“The KNC is close to
Barzani. Barzani wanted to impose his policies in Rojava and Turkey wanted to
use Barzani to establish an alternative group to the PYD, which was the KNC.
They tried hard, but failed. The KNC is not stronger than the PYD,” Iso said.
Turkish Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdogan is expected to meet Barzani in Diyarbakir at the weekend.
According to Turkish
media sources, Erdogan will visit Diyarbakir, a predominantly Kurdish city in
southeastern Turkey on Saturday, when he will be meeting the Iraqi Kurdistan
president.
A source from Turkish
Channel Show TV said renowned Kurdish
singer Shivan Perwer will be back to Diyarbakir from self-exile in Germany to
meet Barzani and Erdogan.
Relations between
Iraq’s Kurdistan Region and Turkey have been improving steadily of late.
The
volume of trade between Iraq and Turkey is about $12 billion, with three
quarters of it being between Ankara and the Kurdistan Region.
Iran
Writing for the Saudi daily Asharq
Alawsat today, former editor-in-chief Tariq Alhomayed quotes a Reuters dispatch yesterday as saying the
Kurds’ military gains in Syria is posing a dilemma for regional
powers.
Syrian Kurds view
Syria’s civil war as an opportunity to gain the kind of autonomy enjoyed by
their ethnic kin in neighboring Iraq.
The seriousness of the
report, says Alhomayed, is that their offensive has stirred mixed feelings,
globally, regionally and locally, even among some fellow Kurds, who say the
Kurdish fighters have drifted into an Iran-led regional axis supportive of
Assad, something they deny.
To Assad and his Shiite
allies, their gains mean more territory out of Sunni rebel hands two and a half
years into a revolt against his rule.
Islamist rebels --
particularly the Qaeda-linked al-Nusra Front and the Islamic State of Iraq and
the Levant (ISIL) that have been imposing their will across rebel-held
territory -- argue that their defeat says more about who was helping their foes
than the strength of the Kurdish forces themselves. They said help from Assad's
forces and Shiite-led Iraq was the reason for Kurdish gains.
The Iraqi government
strongly denies supporting any faction in Syria, including Kurds.
A closer reading of
this and other reports shows the
Kurds’ military gains in Syria are posing a bigger dilemma for
Syrian Kurds than for regional powers.
A senior Iraqi
politician told Reuters Shiite
powerhouse Iran, Assad's main regional ally, was also actively backing the PYD
and emboldening the PKK, with which it is closely aligned.
"Iran supports
these groups to guarantee having a powerful group in Syria in case things go
out of control," he said, adding that Tehran was creating a network of
allies from minority groups across the country to bolster their interests and
to create alternative partners should Assad fall.
The Iraqi politician
said Baghdad's Shiite government was supporting the Kurds to weaken
cross-border ties among Sunnis.
"(They) may help
them in cooperation with Iran to create an autonomous Kurdish region ... to
establish a buffer zone between Iraqi and Syrian Sunnis."
This of course means
the Kurds will have hostile and unbalanced relations with a predominantly Sunni
region.
Also, can Syria’s Kurds
genuinely withstand Turkey’s ire and eventually that of Tehran, which is home
to eight million Iranian Kurds?
Syrian Kurds are set to
realize that you don’t build nation-states by simply having minorities go their
separate ways.
