US Special Representative for Syria Engagement: our relationship with SDF will continue
(North Press) – In a teleconference on Thursday, US Special Representative for Syria Engagement and Special Envoy to the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS James Jeffrey stated that the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in northern Syria “are doing, with the help of the coalition, an extraordinarily good job sustaining the successes we’ve had,” adding that the relationship “is a very successful cooperation and will continue.”
Jeffrey, a former ambassador to Turkey and Iraq who assumed the office of Special Representative for Syria Engagement in 2018, criticized both the Assad government and Russian military in Syria, stating that “they’re not doing a good job” in terms of fighting the Islamic State in government-held areas, though according to Jeffrey, the US has attempted to coordinate with Russia to confront ISIS in these regions.
When asked about recent SDF reports indicating that Turkey is smuggling ISIS members out of northern Syria’s infamous Hol camp for ISIS families, Jeffrey replied, “We have a deal with the Turks for their Operation Peace Spring area negotiated on the 17th of October. All sides are basically adhering to it,” adding that the US sees the situation in Syria’s northeast as “stable.”
Turkish Armed Forces and Turkish-backed armed opposition groups took control of the cities of Sere Kaniye and Tel Abyad and their surrounding countrysides in October of 2019. Since this time, residents in the region have reported many human rights abuses, including theft, looting, assault, kidnapping and murder.
Jeffrey was later asked if the US government had seen any consequences from the Caesar Act sanctions, a set of economic sanctions imposed on the Syrian government and its allies which came into effect in June. Jeffrey stated his belief that the Syrian government had been weakened by the act, though he blamed much of the government’s economic troubles on Iran’s interference in Syria, accusing the country of efforts “to create a Shia Crescent in the northern Levant, from Tehran through Baghdad, Damascus, the Bekaa Valley, [and] Beirut.”
However, Jeffrey did add that the sanctions did not intend to cause the collapse of the government in Damascus, and that “[US] policy isn’t regime change; our policy is a change in behavior of whoever is governing in Damascus.”