SDC Representative: The U.S. Senate agrees with our visions

Sinam Muhammad, the Syrian Democratic Council (SDC) envoy to Washington DC, said the senators’ stances were in full conformity with the vision of the SDC, as they find it unrealistic to remove the political arm of those who defeated the Islamic State (ISIS) from the constitutional committee. Earlier on Monday the 23th of September, the Secretary-General of the United Nations Antonio Guterres announced  the formation of the Constitutional Committee, after 20 months of attempts.

The Constitutional Committee comprises of 150 persons, 50 of whom were chosen by the Syrian government, 50 by the Syrian opposition (basically based in Turkey), and the rest by the United Nations as “representatives of the civil society”.

The Autonomous Administration in North and East Syria has issued a statement on September the 26th, indicating that “the results of the Constitutional Commission do not concern us, while taking into account Turkey’s sensitivity, which has exceeded Syria’s internal stability”.

“The exclusion of the political arm of the only forces who fought and defeated the Islamic State in the Syrian territories is unrealistic and illogical”,  Ms. Muhammad told North-Press. “Our friends in the Senate promised to push for a fairer Syrian solution for all its components, in a way that would make the 5 million people of north and eastern Syria politically represented in any future visions for the country”, Muhammad added.

For her part, Elizabeth Goureyeh, the the vice chairperson of the executive body of the Autonomous Administration, told North-Press on the sidelines of the meetings in Washington between SDC officials and members of the U.S. Senate that the visit “is to study the latest developments of north and eastern Syria amid the threats of invasion against our region by Turkey”, Elizabeth Goureyeh said.

“We are also discussing with senators and a number of the U.S. administration officials the exclusion of the Syrian Democratic Council (SDC) from the constitutional committee, which is planned to draft a new constitution for the country”, she said, pointing out that “in this case, such a constitution will neither concern nor represent us, especially as it was arranged following a meeting between the three countries, (Russia, Turkey and Iran)”, she said.

Ms. Gawreyeh had previously told North-Press about the reasons for the visit, where she said: “The meeting is to clarify some of the obstacles and challenges we are experiencing in Syria, especially in the north and east of Syria, relying on dialogue and diplomatic work, which is a mechanism we have adopted since the beginning of the movement, with clarification of the fears of the Autonomous Administration”.

She stressed that SDC vision of Syria lied in bringing full and equal rights to all components of the region, regardless of their religious or ethnic affiliations.

Ahed al-Hindi, a project manager of the U.S. Hercules group working on conflict-affected areas, says that talking about the presence of Syrians from the northeast in the committee as an alternative to the Syrian Democratic Council is “a caricature justification and falls under the framework of black comedy”.

The U.N. Special Envoy to Syria Geir Pederson has confirmed on September 29, that the Constitutional Committee includes members of the Syrian Kurds, saying: “I did not count the number of members of the Committee from the ethnic side, but I can say that it contains Kurdish members”.

“The constitutional committee in its current form would turn Syria back and prevent reconstruction process in Syria. The absence of effective representatives on the ground in the constitutional committee means there are no factors capable of implementing what will be written”, al-Hindi added.

“The United States and the Arab countries have spent billions of dollars to produce a moderate opposition to be deployed on the ground, but failed”, he pointed out.
Al-Hindi concluded saying: “There are three actors in Syria: the (Syrian) regime, al-Qaeda group and the Syrian Democratic Council, as the latter will guarantee secularism and democracy of any future constitution, while the Constitutional Committee is a new failure for the opposition”.