Northern Syria is not Kurdish, is Arabic, Bashar al-Assad says

2019-11-16 00:00:00 - From: Iraq News

DAMASCUS,— Northern Syria is not Kurdish, Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad said in an interview with Russia’s media outlets RUSSIA 24 and Rossiya Segodnya.

In the interview aired on Friday, Assad touched on a number of topics, including that of Kurds and their forces in Syrian Kurdistan, the northern and northeastern Syria.

The president, who made sure to say non-Arab groups, such as Armenians and Kurds, had come to Syria in the past 100 years, and argued that northern Syria, which Kurds call Rojava and consider part of greater Kurdistan, is home to an Arab majority.

“I would like to clarify that this area in northern and northeastern Syria is a majority Arab area. 70% of the residents are Arabs, not the other way around. Even the forces fighting there are a mixture of Kurds and Arabs,” Assad said.

“Things are different from northern Iraq and southeast of Turkey. There is no Kurdish majority in this area,” said Assad.

The country’s north and northeast have been controlled for years by Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, a mixture of Kurdish, Arab and Christian fighters who were instrumental in the war against the Islamic State (ISIS). The Kurdish-led forces were closely supported by the US during the fight against the terror group.

“The Americans, however, supported the Kurdish groups and gave them the leadership to create the image that the area is Kurdish to create a Kurdish rivalry with the other groups in Syria,” Assad claimed.

However, Assad stated that they have problem with only “a section” of Kurds who are “political extremists” that support “separatist propositions”.

“This doesn’t mean that the Kurds are not patriotic. I affirm that most of the Kurds are patriotic, standing with their state and the Syrian people, just like any other component,” he added.

Assad also, indirectly, rejected cultural rights for Kurds that the Kurdish-led authorities have been asking for since day one, equating it to separatism.

“Why do we give cultural rights to a group and not to another? For a simple reason. The reason why is because the group that says this have proposed separatist proposition. Neither today nor tomorrow, both as a state and people, [will we] accept any separatist proposition,” Assad explained.

As for Kurdish-led forces, there are talks to have them join the Syrian Army, Assad revealed.

“Communications [with the Kurdish groups] continue. It was not cut off during the war despite knowing that some of these groups are dealing with the Americans, led by the Americans, armed by the Americans, funded by Americans, its statements written by the Americans,” said Assad.

“There is currently dialogue, following the return of the Syrian Army [to Kurdish-controlled areas], for the purpose of persuading them that stability can be established when we all adhere to the Syrian constitution as the constitution is an expression of the people.”

There has been “progress”, and at times there is stalling because there is “American pressure” exerted on the Kurdish-led forces “so that it doesn’t respond to the Syrian state”, added Assad.

“Currently we are more optimistic that things are going towards this direction [of settlement],” claimed Assad.

Assad said his administration has already declared its agreement to integrate the Kurdish fighters into the Syrian army. However, the Kurdish militias are still reluctant to make such a move.

As for Kurdish-led forces joining the Syrian Army, the Syrian president claimed that Syria and Russia are trying to “persuade” the forces that joining the Syrian Army to “fight the Turkish invader” is the “right place”.

“We have to keep trying to see in the next weeks how things turn out.”

The Kurdish SDF previously rejected a call from the Syrian Defense Ministry for their forces to join the Syrian Arab Army, arguing that their special status must be preserved.

Nearly 3 million Kurds live in Syrian Kurdistan. Syrian Kurds have long sought official recognition of the Kurdish language and their culture in Syria.

Under Assad ruling the Kurdish language is not allowed to be taught in schools. In 1962, 20% of Syria’s ethnic Kurdish population were deprived of Syrian citizenship following a controversial census.

Kurds in Syria also suffer severe discrimination because of their ethnicity. Many of them are denied Syrian nationality and therefore do not receive the full provision of education, employment, health care and other rights enjoyed by Syrian nationals.

Freedom of expression was tightly controlled in Syria, and Assad security forces have sweeping powers of arrest and detention. Kurds in Syria often speak Kurdish in public, unless all those present do not.

Kurdish human rights activists were mistreated and persecuted. No political parties are allowed for any group, Kurdish or otherwise.

Suppression of ethnic identity of Kurds in Syria include: various bans on the use of the Kurdish language; refusal to register children with Kurdish names; replacement of Kurdish place names with new names in Arabic; prohibition of businesses that do not have Arabic names; not permitting Kurdish private schools; and the prohibition of books and other materials written in Kurdish.

Syria’s Kurds have established a semi-autonomous region in northeastern Syria during the country’s eight-year war.

In 2013, the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party PYD — the political branch of the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) — has established three autonomous Cantons of Jazeera, Kobani and Afrin and a Kurdish government across Syrian Kurdistan in 2013. On March 17, 2016, Kurdish and Arab authorities announced the creation of a “federal region” made up of those semi-autonomous regions in Syrian Kurdistan.

The Kurdish Democratic Union Party PYD and its powerful military wing YPG/YPJ, considered the most effective fighting force against IS in Syria and U.S. has provided them with arms. The YPG, which is the backbone of the Syrian Democratic Forces SDF forces, has seized swathes of Syria from Islamic State.

The Kurdish forces expelled the Islamic State from its last patch of territory in the eastern Syrian village of Baghouz in March 2019.

11,000 Kurdish male and female fighters had been killed in five years of war to eliminate the Islamic State “caliphate” that once covered an area the size of Great Britain in Syria and Iraq.

Regarding the Turkish-Russian agreement in Sochi last month about the need for the Kurdish militia to withdraw 30 km from the Syrian-Turkish border, al-Assad said this agreement must be implemented.

However, he charged that the presence of the Kurdish militia in the border area was the pretext of the Turkish government to launch military offensive in northern Syria.

The president noted that following the implementation of the Turkish-Russian agreement, the Turkish army must withdraw from the areas it has stormed since Oct. 9.

“We are cooperating with Russia in order to fully implement this agreement, after which we should tell the Turks to start withdrawing,” he said.

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