SDC Senior Official: We Want to Negotiate with Turkey to Prevent War

Hassan Muhammad-Ali, Syrian Democratic Council (SDC) presidential council member said: “We want to negotiate with Turkey to prevent war despite its attacks against us”, pointing out that after the end of ISIS territorial existence, and under the argument that Kurds make threats to the Turkish security, Turkey has adopted a new strategy starting from Manbij, and trying to apply it in all areas of eastern Syria in an attempt to prevent carrying out their project by threats of intervening the region.

  

Muhammad Ali’s speech came during a dialogue meeting organized by “Barchav” Organization for Democratic Development at the Headquarters of the Bar Association in Kobani, about the period entitlement in north and east Syria with those working in politics and administration fields, where it was attended by a number of political, civilian, community and cultural figures.  

Mr. Muhammad-Ali pointed out that SDC’s relations with the Syrian government aren’t halted, explaining that they want to develop their relations with Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) and Iraq together, in consideration that there is a trade exchange that affects the political relations.  

Muhammad-Ali added that they as SDC, have drawn a political strategy to establish relations with the Syrian opposition, Syrian National Coalition, and other opposition groups, by organizing a national democratic conference northern Syria, so that northern Syria might become a center for the Syrian opposition.  

He also pointed out that they’ve started establishing several workshops in Europe, and they will also organize others in north and east Syria after holding three meetings, two of them in Ein Issa northern Raqqa and the third one in Kobani. 

With regard to the establishment of the safe zone, Muhammad-Ali noted that they proposed to establish a safe zone that consists of 5 km in width in the border area, in which the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) will withdraw from border areas at the zero point, also the withdrawal of heavy weapons to set out of the reach range to Turkey, adding: “So that International Coalition patrols have to be in this area to control the Turkish army and us.”  

“We’ve suggested bringing local forces into this region and we told the US to choose those forces by itself, under the condition that Turkey mustn’t interfere in this region, as people here see if Turkey interferes in this region, a repeated scenario of Afrin would happen to here as well,” Muhammad-Ali added.  

Muhammad-Ali also stated that Turkey insisted to interfere in the region for about 32 km in depth and take part in patrols and the observation posts, pointing out that they’ve agreed to Turkey’s participation in patrols and observation posts under the condition of solving the issue of Afrin and to let its people return back to their homes, but with the latest escalation in Idlib, the negotiations were stopped, according to Ali.  

Regarding the presence of the Syrian government forces in the safe zone, Ali stressed that the US-led International Coalition refuses any presence of the Syrian government in the region. 

About the challenges facing the region, the member of the presidential council of SDC stressed that they face several challenges at this period, indicating that these challenges are Turkey in the north and Syrian government in the other.  

“We have to think rationally in order not to rush and make mistakes that we did in Afrin, which had consequences we bear now, where we could have protected Afrin by adopting a rational policy, but now we are paying this bill,” he said.  

Muhammad-Ali added that the other challenge they face within the region is the security issue, saying: “After its territorial defeat, ISIS turned itself into a security state and placed sleeper cells to fight us from inside our region, while after the US decision of keeping troops in the region, and the collapse of Russia, Iran, Turkey, and the Syrian government hopes to control the region, these countries concluded to draw new strategies by the prevention of security stability in the region, and the attempts to prevent building confidence on our project that is being applied in the region, so they are trying to spread discord between Arabs and Kurds, while promoting that Kurds control Arab territories, and they are expanding in the region.”  

Muhammad-Ali also pointed out that those states are trying to assassinate and kill people who are close to this project, so that people will move away and make them afraid, as a result, they will show that there is no security in this region.  

While they’ve set up a plan to carry out a security campaign in cooperation with the Global Coalition to target ISIS sleeper cells and to defeat their sources in the region starting in Al-Bagouz east of Deir Az-Zour until Manbij in the north of the country. 

About the future of the region especially after ISIS territorial defeat, Muhammad-Ali said that “Despite military victories that we’ve achieved, but the international agreements brought us out of the political equation,” noting that the new schemes and projects need many more years to be applied, and the political conflict may continue until 2025.  

Muhammad-Ali stressed that the absence of all Syrian components in the negotiations of the Syrian crisis, will not lead to a real solution, but will lead to further delay in reaching a political solution in the region.  

He stated that in the first place, the war is among super international powers, but because of the international changes, democratic people have got a historic opportunity to take their place in this period, pointing out that politics shouldn’t be analyzed according to narrow and small events, the US and Russia for example, don’t show their strategy directly, so they must know the strategies of great countries in order to take advantage of.  

“In this period, Russia wants via Syria, to become an alternative to the International Coalition in the Middle East in order to interfere in Lebanon and Iraq and take advantage of the new differences,” Ali said, adding that President Trump’s decision of the close withdrawal from the region, was analyzed as a non-strategic withdrawal “Because withdrawing from Syria will leave the field to other forces.”  

Muhammad-Ali stressed that in the current situation, a strategy must be drawn for the future, saying: “The new logic of the policy requires differences on one hand and relations on the other, so we, as SDC, depended on a strategy of viewing differences within the framework of relations, and within the framework of differences by turning them into relations and take advantage of this controversy in the future.”