A Kurdish-led militia alliance which controls north-eastern Syria has agreed a deal to combine all army and civilian establishments into the Syrian state, the nation’s presidency says.
The settlement says the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) will stop hostilities and hand over management of the area’s border posts, airport, and important oil and fuel fields.
It additionally recognises the Kurdish minority as “an integral a part of the Syrian state” and ensures “the rights of all Syrians to illustration and participation within the political course of”.
SDF commander Mazloum Abdi referred to as the deal, which he signed alongside interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa, a “actual alternative to construct a brand new Syria”.
“We’re dedicated to constructing a greater future that ensures the rights of all Syrians and fulfils their aspirations for peace and dignity,” he wrote on X on Monday evening.
The deal represents a serious step in direction of Sharaa’s aim to unite the fractured nation after his Sunni Islamist group led the insurgent offensive that overthrew president Bashar al-Assad in December.
The scale of that problem has been made clear by the latest violence in western Syria, the place assaults on safety forces by Assad loyalists triggered reprisals wherein greater than 1,000 civilians had been reportedly killed, most of them members of Assad’s minority Alawite sect.
The deal may additionally de-escalate the SDF’s battle with neighbouring Turkey and Turkish-backed Syrian former insurgent factions allied to the federal government, which are attempting to push the alliance out of areas close to the border.
The SDF, which has tens of 1000’s of well-armed and well-trained fighters, was not aligned with both Assad’s regime or the opposition in the course of the nation’s 13-year civil conflict.
It presently controls greater than 46,000 sq km (18,000 sq miles) of territory within the north-east, the place it defeated the Islamic State (IS) group in 2019 with the assistance of a US-led coalition.
The SDF performs a serious function within the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES), which governs the area additionally identified to Kurds as Rojava.
About 10,000 IS fighters are being detained in SDF-run prisons unfold throughout the area and about 46,000 different folks linked to IS, largely ladies and youngsters, are held in a number of camps.
For the reason that fall of Assad, the SDF has warned that assaults from Turkish-backed factions are forcing it to divert fighters away from guarding the prisons and paving the way in which for an IS resurgence.
The Turkish authorities views the largest militia within the SDF, the Kurdish Individuals’s Safety Items (YPG), as a terrorist organisation. It says it the YPG is an extension of the banned Kurdistan Employees’ Occasion (PKK) group that waged an insurgency in Turkey for many years however whose imprisoned chief lately declared a ceasefire.
There was no speedy remark from Turkey in response to Monday’s settlement.
Between 25 and 35 million Kurds inhabit a mountainous area straddling the borders of Turkey, Iraq, Syria, Iran and Armenia. They make up the fourth-largest ethnic group within the Center East, however they’ve by no means obtained a everlasting nation state.
Syria’s Kurds, which make up about make up about 10% of the inhabitants, had been suppressed and denied fundamental rights in the course of the Assad household’s rule.
