Domestic quarrels and fears of a fractured nation are formidable hurdles on the path to KRG self-rule.
What does Massoud Barzani want?
The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) announced that it would hold an independence referendum on September 25.
This section outlines broad contextual factors that help to explain the YPG/PYD’s rise to power during the early years of the Syrian conflict. It seeks to understand what circumstances enabled the organisation to achieve remarkable gains and autonomy in the space of just a few years after decades of repression by the Syrian regime of most domestic Kurdish political activity. As a PYD representative put it: ‘Let us go back to before 2011. The PYD was forbidden in Syria and Turkey. You can say that the majority of the PYD was locked up in regime prisons. In Damascus? In all provinces!’[11] Our analysis suggests that at least five storylines must be woven together to explain the rise of the YPG/PYD in the early years of the Syrian civil war, regardless of the specific strategies the group has pursued since then (these are analysed in Section 2).
A first element of the story are the policies of marginalisation, Arabisation and repression that Gamal Abdel Nasr applied to the Kurdish population of Syria after 1958 (during the United Arab Republic) and Syria’s various Ba’ath regimes after 1963. Lasting for decades, such policies broke up many communities in Syria’s Kurdish areas through a mix of symbolic and material measures, ranging from re-naming cities and villages.[12] keeping tens of thousands of Kurds stateless, enacting demographic changes, purposeful underdevelopment, and the incarceration of political dissidents.[13] It should be noted that the autocratic nature of the various Ba’ath regimes, especially under the Assads, created a generic level of repression across Syrian society in which Kurdish-specific repression was nested.[14] Moreover, Syrian Kurds could be part of the state apparatus and army as long as they fully embraced the regime and relegated their Kurdishness to the background.[15] Nevertheless, the regime did single Syrian Kurdish communities out for particularly intense and targeted repressive treatment out of concern that the country’s most substantial non-ruling minority might threaten its hold on power. Since the regime perceived the Kurds as not fitting the Arab nature of the Syrian state, the loyalty of this group was in doubt and its ‘othering’ facilitated a prism of repression to take hold.[16] For the purpose of this report, the relevance of these policies is that they created a climate of fear and distrust among Syrian Kurdish communities and political leaders. This climate was maintained by the presence of widespread regime intelligence informant networks.[17]
A Syrian activist described the climate this engendered in the following manner: ‘Back in 1977, when Hafez al-Assad was in power, […] if you spoke Kurdish, or if they saw a Kurdish book with you, that was enough to arrest you: then you were a threat to state security. More than 250,000 Syrian Kurds did not have passports, let alone civil rights. My father is a Syrian national, but his sister and her children are not. Moreover, the regime removed Kurds to bring about demographic changes. They brought Arabs from Aleppo and Raqqa to our territory, took land from Kurds and gave it to the Arabs. Under Hafez al-Assad, no fewer than 68 leaders of the Kurdish democratic parties have been detained without trial.’[18]
Over most of two decades, Abu Mohammad al-Jolani’s life has been a roadmap of Islamist militancy in Iraq and Syria. He joined the fight against U.S. forces in Iraq and was jailed by the Americans. He became a commander within the group known as the Islamic State of Iraq. He founded an Al Qaeda affiliate in Syria and then broke with Al Qaeda and ISI, striking out with his own group to oppose Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
The Islamic State terror group has increased its attacks on Iraqi and Kurdish security forces, killing nearly two dozen people in the last month, according to Iraqi officials.
Local government sources and public statements show that a wave of IS bombings and hit-and-run attacks, affecting largely the territories disputed between the Iraqi government and the Kurdistan Region, have killed at least 21 people and wounded dozens more.
The US military has secretly transferred Daesh families from the dangerous al-Hawl detention camp in Syria, which is run by allied Kurdish militants, to a facility in Iraq’s northern province of Nineveh, a report says.
A high-ranking Iraq security source, requesting anonymity, told Iraqi Arabic-language al-Maalomah news agency on Friday that American forces relocated scores of children and women to Jeddah camp some 65 kilometers (40 miles) south of Mosul.
The transfers took place under the supervision of authorities from the so-called Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria, also known as Rojava.
The Taliban have attacked a sanctuary of the Islamic State terrorist group in central Parwan province.
Several IS fighters were killed and detained in Friday’s raid in Charikar, the provincial capital, said Taliban spokesman Bilal Karimi.
The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has announced a three-week ceasefire, starting from October 2I.
The outlawed militant out made the announcement hours after Prime Minister Imran Khan said his government was in talks with TTP.
Although the streets of Kurdish cities in Turkey were largely empty politicians took to social media to defend the Erbil government.
As pressure on the Kurdistan Region by the US, UK, France grew, with threats from Iran and Turkey and disapproval from the UN Security Council to postpone or cancel the Monday referendum on secession from Iraq, Kurdish factions across the region rallied to back the vote.
As the post-independence referendum fallout between Erbil and Baghdad reaches a dangerous juncture, Baghdad strives to divide the Kurds through military threats and conditions.
As the post-independence referendum fallout between Erbil and Baghdad reaches a dangerous juncture, Baghdad strives to divide the Kurds through military threats and conditions.
Monitoring groups and Kurdish media in Syria on Thursday said Turkish-backed Syrian opposition have transported thousands of families from Ghouta to the Kurdish enclave of Afrin over the last month.
Monitoring groups and Kurdish media in Syria on Thursday said Turkish-backed Syrian opposition have transported thousands of families from Ghouta to the Kurdish enclave of Afrin over the last month.