Category Archives: rusya

Mutlu Çiviroğlu 18:50 on February 6, 2019  

Li Washingtonê projeya Rojava

Hevseroka MSD´ê Ilham Ehmed li Washigtonê di panelekê de got, ew alîkariyê ji bo projeya xwe ya siyasî dixwazin û divê ew di nava çareseriyeke siyasî de cihê xwe bigirin.

Bi organîzasyona ARCDEM´ê (‏Navenda Rojava a ji bo Demokrasiyê ya Emerîkî) bi navê  “Piştî DAIŞ´ê? Bakurê Sûriyê li ber duriyanekê” li paytexta Emerîkayê Washingtonê panelek bi rê ve çû. Di vê panelê de Hevseroka Meclîsa Sûriyeya Demokratîk (MSD) Îlham Ehmed, ji zanîngeha Columbiayê Prof. David L. Phillips, analîstê ji Center for a New American Security (CNAS) Nicholas A. Heras û nivîskara pirtûka “Nearamiya Civakî û Baregehên Eskerî yên Emerîkî li Tirkiye û Elmanyayê ji 1945´an ve” Amy Austin Holmes weke qiseker amade bûn. Rojnamevan û analîstê siyasî Mutlu Çiviroglu moderatoriya panelê kir. Li mekanê panelê Press Club a li paytexta DYE´yê, gelek kes û rojnamevan amade bûn.

Destekê bidin projeya me ya siyasî

Hevseroka MSD´ê Ilham Ehmed axaftina destpêkê ya di panelê de kir û got, “Li Sûriyê niha krîzek heye, û ev krîz kûrtir bû. Em projeyeke nû ji bo Sûriyeke nenavendî pêşniyaz dikin û em hez dikin vê projeyê li tevahiya welêt pêk bînin.”

Ilham Ehmed ji bo dewra Tirkiyeyê li Sûriyê eşkere peyivî û got, “Dewleta Tirk li Sûriyê bi roleke gelekî xirab rabû. Li Efrînê wan komkujî kirin. Pirraniya xelkê Efrînê bi darê zorê koçber kirin. Wan çete û malbatên wan anîn Efrînê û demografî guherand. Wan mal û milkê xelkê dizî û dest avêt jinan.”

Îlham Ehmed navê terorîzmê li van kirinên dewleta Tirk kir: “Em dizanin ku ya Tirkiye dike terorîzm bi xwe ye. Îro, ya em dibêjin ew e ku divê ewlekarî û aramiya herêma me bê parastin. Ya ku em dibêjin ev e; me ewlekariya dinyayê parast (li dijî DAIŞ´ê), em xwe ji bo ewlekariya mirovahiyê berpirsiyar dibînin. Pêdiviya me bi alîkariya wan welatan heye ku me ew parastin.”

Ka ev alîkarî wê alîkariyeke çawa be jî, ji van gotinên Îlham Ehmed diyar bû: “Pêdiviya me bi alîkariya ji bo projeya me ya siyasî heye. Divê em di çareseriyeke siyasî de hebin. Destûrnedana beşdarbûna me di pêvajoya Cenevreyê de zexmkirina krîzê ye, zexmkirina şer e.”

Tenê QSD dikare bi DAIŞ´ê

Nicholas A. Heras di panelê de got, “Ya ku li vir em behsa wê dikin tevgerek e ku hewl dide gelêrî be û bersivê bide daxwazên gel. Li ber çavê me, ha vê kêliyê ya ku em dibînin, bi gewdebûna îdeala sivaka demokratîk e.” Li gorî wî, ji bilî QSD´ê jî ti hêza din wê nikaribe li dijî DAIŞ´ê herêmê biparêze: “Ti hêzeke din a cihî û bikêrhatî (ji bilî QSD´ê) nîne ku karibe ji nû ve derketina holê ya DAIŞ´ê asteng bike.”

Amy Austin Holmes jî îşaret bi girîngiya têkbirina daîmî ya DAIŞ´ê kir û got, “Rêya herî muhim a misogerkirina şikandina daîmî ya DAIŞ´ê ew e ku bê misogerkirin ku îdeolojiya tundraw a Îslamî bê têkbirin.”

WASHINGTON

Li Washingtonê projeya Rojava

 

Mutlu Çiviroğlu 18:43 on February 6, 2019  

İnsanlığın güvenliği için siyasi çözümde olmalıyız

ABD Başkanı Donald Trump’ın Suriye’den asker çekme kararının adından Kürtlerle ilişkiler ve Türk devletinin işgal saldırısı yönündeki tehditleri halen tartışma olurken, Suriye Demokratik Meclisi (MSD) Yürütme Konseyi Eşbaşkanı İlham Ehmed’in Washington’daki temasları da sürüyor.

10 günden fazla bir zamandır ABD’li yetkililer, Kongre ve Senato üyeleriyle görüşen Ehmed, önceki gün katıldığı panelde  Türkiye’nin Kuzey Suriye’de tümüyle teröre yöneldiğini, kendilerinin ise insanlığın güvenliğini sağladığını söyledi.

Amerika-Rojava Demokrasi Merkezi’nin (American Rojava Center for Democracy‏) organizesiyle Washington’da ‘DAİŞ’ten sonra Kuzey Suriye’de yol ayrımı adlı bir panel düzenlendi. Gazeteci Mutlu Çiviroğlu’nun moderatörlüğünü yaptığı panele  Ehmed’in yanı sıra Colombia Üniversitesi’nden Prof. David L. Phillips, Center for a New American Security (CNAS) analisti Nocholas A. Heras ve ‘Social Unrest and American Military Bases in Turkey and Germany since 1945- 1945’ten bu yana Toplumsal İstikrarsızlık ve ABD’nin Almanya ve Türkiye’deki Üsleri’ kurumundan Amy Austin Holmes, konuşmacı olarak katıldı.

İlk sözü alan Ehmed “Suriye’de bir kriz var ve bu kriz daha da derinleşti. Biz merkezi olmayan bir Suriye için yeni bir proje sunuyoruz. Bu projenin tüm ülkede hayata geçmesini istiyoruz” dedi.

‘Siyasi çözümde yerimizi almalıyız’

Türk devletinin Suriye’ye yönelik saldırıları hakkında da MSD Eşbaşkanı İlham Ehmed şunları belirtti: “Türk devleti Suriye’de kötü bir rol oynadı. Efrîn’de katliam yaptı. Efrîn halkının çoğu saldırılar karşısında göç etmek zorunda kaldı. Efrîn’e yerleştirdikleri çete ve ailelerle kentin demografik yapısını değiştirdi. Halkın malını çaldılar, kadınlara tecavüz ettiler. Türk devletinin bu yaptığı terörizmdir. Bugün bizim istediğimiz bölgemizin güvenliği ve istikrarının korunmasıdır. DAİŞ’e karşı biz dünyanın güvenliğini sağladık. Kendimizi insanlığın güvenliği için sorumlu görüyoruz. Koruduğumuz ülkelerin desteğine ihtiyacımız var. Siyasi projemizin geliştirilmesi için desteğe ihtiyacımız var. Siyasi çözümde biz de yerimizi almalıyız. Cenevre görüşmelerine katılımımızın engellenmesi, krizin daha da büyümesi ve savaşın daha da derinleştirilmesi anlamına geliyor.”

Sadece DAİŞ’i QSD yenebilir

Nicholas A. Heras de panelde yaptığı konuşmada “Burada söz konusu olan halkın ihtiyaçlarına cevap olmaya çalışan bir hareket. Demokratik toplum idaali ile hareket ediyor. QSD dışında hiç bir güç bölgeyi DAİŞ’e karşı koruyamaz. QSD’nin dışında DAİŞ’nin tekrar hortlamasını hiç bir güç engelleyemez” dedi.

Amy Austin Holmes de DAİŞ’nin tamamen ortadan kaldırılmasının önemine değindi ve şu ifadeyi kullandı: “DAİŞ’nin tamamen ortadan kaldırılması ancak İslam adına yapılan şiddet iddolojisinin ortadan kaldırılmasıyla mümkündür.”

Öte yandan HDP’nin ABD Temsilcisi Giran Özcan önceki akşam telefonla Medya TV’de Heval Aslan’ın sorularını yanıtladı.

Özcan Ehmed’in temasları ve ABD’deki tartışmalar hakkında şunları söyledi: “İlham Ehmed, temasları kapsamında hem yetkililer, hem de Kongre ve Senato üyeleriyle görüştü. Trump ile kısa bir görüşmesi oldu. Trump’ın Suriye’den asker çekme kararına Kongre ve Sanato üyeleri karşı çıkmıştı. Bu konuda şu anda bir yasa tasarısı var. Kürtlerin askeri olarak korunmasını içeren bir yasa tasarısı sunuldu. İlham Ehmed aynı zamanda buradaki toplum ile de görüşüyor. Geçmişle kıyasladığımızda basının çok büyük ilgisi var. İlham Ehmed’in yürüttüğü temaslar bir şekilde basına da yansıyor. Trump’ın çıkışı her ne kadar hem iktidar hem de farklı çevrelerde bir şaşkınlık yaratsa da bu kararın üzerinden geçen bir buçuk ayda Beyaz Saray dışında Amerika’daki atmosfer, ABD’nin Kürt halkına ihanet etmemesi yönündedir. Bu konuda herkes hem fikirdir. Bu olay Savunma Bakanı Jim Mattis ve bazı yöneticilerin adeta kafasını aldı.”

Trump’ın asker çekme kararının ardından, Türk devleti özellikle Kürtlerin bulunduğu Kuzey Suriye’de ‘güvenli bölge’ adı altında kendi askerleri ve çetelerinin işgal edeceği bir ‘güvenli bölge’ yaratmak istiyor. Erdoğan’ın “güvenli bölge konusunda Amerika ile anlaştık” sözü de Özcan’a soruldu.

Özcan soruyu şu sözlerle yanıtladı: “Şu anda ABD’de hem Türkler hem de Suriye’deki Kürtlerin uzlaştırılması noktasında bir arayış da var. ABD, ilk defa iki taraftan da üzerinde anlaşabilecekleri bir plana imza atmak istiyor. İki tarafı da buna ikna etmeye çalışıyor. James Jeffrey bölgedeydi. Bugünlerde buraya geri dönecek ve bu konuda her hangi bir ilerleme kaydedip, kaydetmediğini buradaki yönetime aktaracak. Suriye Kürtlerinin ve Türk devletinin bunu kabul edip etmeyeceği  burada tartışılıyor. Tabii Kürtler, Türk devletinin denetiminde olan ve Türk askerlerinin içinde olacağı bir tampon bölgeyi kabul etmiyor. Bu onaylanması zor bir plan olarak görülüyor. Ancak yönetim ve Dışişleri Bakanlığı umutlu görünüyor. Kuzey Suriye’de böyle bir anlaşmaya varılabilirse bunun Türkiye ve PKK arasında yeniden bir uzlaşmanın olabileceğini dair umutlu olan bir kesim var. Ancak şimdi bu ne kadar gerçekçi? Mevcut Erdoğan iktidarı bir siyasi parti olan HDP’yi bile bu kadar hedef noktasına getirirken, HDP’yi ‘terörle’ suçladığı bir ortamda bu ne kadar gerçekçi olabilir? Bu da ayrı bir tartışma konusu.”

Pentagon: DAİŞ yeniden dirilebilir

Trump 19 Aralık 2018’de Suriye’den asker çekme kararını gündeme getirdiğinde buna en fazla karşı çıkan ABD Savunma Bakanlığı (Pentagon) olmuştu. Savunma Bakanlığı ana gövdesini YPG/YPJ’nin oluşturduğu QSD güçlerinin gerçekleştirdiği özgürleştirme operasyonlarıyla DAİŞ’in ağır bir yenilgi aldığını ancak asker çekilmesiyle birlikte oluşacak bir boşluk durumunda DAİŞ çetelerinin yeniden canlanacağını belirtiyordu.

Pentagon son olarak önceki gün yeni bir rapor yayınladı. Pengagon raporunda DAİŞ’in 6 ila 12 ay içinde yeniden güçlenebileceği ve sınırlı toprağı yeniden kontrol altına alabileceğini vurguladı. Suriye’de batı ve kuzeyinde otorite boşluğunun yaşandığı bölgelere saklanan DAİŞ’lilerin ABD askerlerinin çekilmesinin ardından yeniden örgütlenebileceği uyarısında bulunuldu. Pentagon raporunda ayrıca Irak ve Suriye’de DAİŞ’in yeniden güçlenmemesi için Sünnilerin sosyo-ekonomik, siyasi ve mezhepsel kaygılarının giderilmesini de önerdi.

HABER MERKEZİ

 

İnsanlığın güvenliği için siyasi çözümde olmalıyız

 

Mutlu Çiviroğlu 04:08 on January 22, 2019  

The distant dream of a secure safe zone in northern Syria

On January 13, U.S. President Donald Trump proposed, in an ambiguous tweet, the creation of a 20-mile safe zone in northern Syria.

Almost 10 days later there is still considerable confusion over what exactly it means and how it might be implemented. The Turkish government wants the area cleared of Syrian Kurdish forces, for instance, while Syrian Kurds oppose any Turkish role. And will it be primarily a Turkish venture, or might the United States spearhead its creation?

Ankara’s preferred safe zone is one that is free of the People’s Protection Units (YPG), Syrian Kurdish fighters that make up the bulk of the multi-ethnic Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) that with U.S. help have largely defeated Islamic State (ISIS) in Syria. The Turkish government says the YPG is as an extension of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) that has been fighting for Kurdish self-rule inside Turkey since 1984.

“The leaks about the buffer zone are unworkable,” Aaron Stein, director of the Middle East programme at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, told Ahval News. “This is going to be fraught and tenuous.”

“I have a hard time accepting why the SDF would choose the U.S. proposal over the [Syrian] regime alternative, and how Moscow could then blow all this up,” he said, referring to talks the Syrian Kurds began with Damascus following Trump’s Dec. 19 announcement he was pulling the U.S.’ 2,000 troops from Syria. The Kurds hope that by ceding their border regions with Turkey to Damascus they can prevent President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s threatened offensive.

Syrian Kurdish authorities have affirmed they will support the creation of a buffer zone if established and run by the United Nations or the U.S.-led coalition. But UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said the UN had no plans to participate in the creation of such a safe zone.

The Kurds adamantly oppose any Turkish involvement in the safe zone.

“We really need a safe zone, but without Turkish fingers,” Salih Muslim, former co-leader of the political wing of the YPG, told Kurdistan 24. “We want a safe area with an air embargo. There must be no role for Turkey.”

Any safe zone that is 20-miles deep along the northern Syrian border would include all the major Kurdish cities in Syria.

“The problem with the buffer zone is that there is little information on how the U.S. expects to keep Turkey from attacking and destroying the SDF,” said Nicholas Heras, Middle East Security Fellow at the Center for a New American Security. “This is the heart of the matter because Turkey’s vision for the buffer zone is for the Turkish military to control the major Kurdish population centres in northeast Syria.”

“A large component of the SDF comes from these Kurdish areas, and it is to be expected that the SDF would fight Turkey, rather than be dismantled by it,” he said. “The buffer zone concept was supposed to achieve a deal between Turkey and the SDF that allows for power sharing in northeast Syria, as a way to prevent disastrous conflict between Turkey and the Syrian Kurds. Any plan to allow Turkey to control the Kurdish areas of northeast Syria will force the SDF into conflict with Turkey because the SDF is existentially threatened by Turkey.”

Heras said the SDF was trying to reach an agreement with Russia and Syrian President Bashar Assad to prevent Turkey seizing land in Syria.

Yaşar Yakış, a Turkish former foreign minister, believes the terms buffer/safe zone are vague.

“A safe zone as it is conceived by Turkey is difficult to set up in northeast Syria. Russia, Iran, the U.S. and many members of the international community will have to be persuaded for it,” Yakış said.

He said Turkey had no means of persuading the SDF to peacefully leave the area.

“However, it may dare to achieve it by using its military power, without persuasion,” Yakış suggested. “If Turkey succeeds in persuading the U.S., Washington has the means to force the YPG to establish a safe zone. But if this is going to be a safe zone with international legitimacy, it has to be sanctioned by a U.N. Security Council resolution, which means that the permanent members of the Security Council – Russia, China, France and the UK – also have to be persuaded.”

Turkey fears the creation of a safe zone similar to the one in northern Iraq after the 1991 Gulf War, which led to Iraqi Kurds achieving autonomy, he said.

“This will be considered a nightmare by Turkey, as it is vehemently opposed to the emergence of any type of Kurdish entity in the north of Syria,” Yakış said.

Mutlu Civiroglu, a Syria and Kurdish affairs analyst, said Trump’s tweet suggested a preference for protecting Syrian Kurds before mentioning the 20-mile safe zone.

“It’s not clear what it really means,” he said. “Assuming the buffer zone is something the U.S. is going to initiate to protect Kurds, that would be positive and would be accepted by Kurds and their allies.”

Russia could stymie the creation of such a zone though, Civiroglu said.

“Moscow can certainly undermine not only this safe zone, but also any development in Syria since it has the power,” he said. “Its move will depend on the details. Russia has the power and capability of preventing or shaping the steps taken by Turkey, the Syrian government and any other player.”

Mustafa Gurbuz, a non-resident fellow at the Arab Center in Washington, said the United States had engaged in dual discourse by promising Turkey a safe zone along its southern border on the one hand and promising Syrian Kurds protection from any potential Turkish attack on the other.

“YPG leaders will not retreat in a silent matter,” he said. “The YPG will exploit U.S.-Russia competition to prevent the Turkish safe zone and, in the case of Turkey-Russia agreement, may use its ties with the Assad regime. Thus, it’s a troubling case for Turkey.”

Paul Iddon

https://ahvalnews.com/buffer-zone/distant-dream-secure-safe-zone-northern-syria

Mutlu Çiviroğlu 20:47 on January 16, 2019  

ISIL-claimed suicide attack in Syria kills 18, including 4 U.S. troops

A suicide attack killed four U.S. personnel in northern Syria Wednesday, costing Washington its worst combat losses in the war-torn country since 2014 as it prepares to withdraw. Nine Syrian civilians and five U.S.-backed fighters were also killed in the attack.

The bombing, claimed by the Islamic State (ISIL) group, comes after U.S. President Donald Trump’s shock announcement last month that he was ordering a full troop withdrawal from Syria because the jihadists had been “largely defeated”.

The Pentagon said, “Two U.S. servicemembers, one Department of Defense (DoD) civilian and one contractor supporting DoD were killed and three servicemembers were injured while conducting a local engagement in Manbij.”

“Initial reports indicate an explosion caused the casualties, and the incident is under investigation,” it said, adding that the names of the dead were being withheld until 24 hours after their families were informed.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights earlier said two Americans soldiers, nine Syrian civilians, and five U.S.-backed fighters were killed in the attack on a restaurant in the northern city of Manbij near the Turkish border.

Rubble littered the outside of the eatery in the city center and its facade was blackened by the blast, footage from a Kurdish news agency showed.

According to Pentagon statistics, Wednesday’s blast was the deadliest attack for U.S. anti-ISIL forces in Syria since they deployed in 2014.

The U.S. Department of Defense has previously only reported two American personnel killed in combat in Syria, in separate incidents.

The Britain-based Observatory, which relies on a network of sources in Syria, said it was the first suicide attack in the city in 10 months.

‘Security zone’

This image grab taken from a video published by Hawar News Agency (ANHA) shows the scene of a suicide attack in the northern Syrian town of Manbij, January 16, 2019. /VCG Photo

Addressing a gathering of U.S. ambassadors in Washington, Vice President Mike Pence did not comment on the attack, saying only that the United States would ensure the defeat of IS, also known as ISIL.

“We’ll stay in the region and we’ll stay in the fight to ensure that ISIL does not rear its ugly head again,” he said.

The bombing comes as Syrian Kurds present in areas around Manbij rejected any Turkish presence in a planned “safe zone” to include Kurdish-held areas along the frontier.

Turkey has repeatedly threatened to attack Washington’s Syrian Kurdish allies, who Ankara views as “terrorists” on its southern flank.

Washington, which has relied heavily on the Kurds in its campaign against IS in Syria, has sought guarantees for their safety since Trump’s pullout announcement.

On Tuesday, Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Ankara would set up a “security zone” in northern Syria following a suggestion by Trump.

But senior Syrian Kurdish political leader Aldar Khalil said any Turkish deployment in Kurdish-held areas was “unacceptable”.

He said the Kurds would accept the deployment of UN forces along a separation line between Kurdish fighters and Turkish troops.

But “other choices are unacceptable as they infringe on the sovereignty of Syria and the sovereignty of our autonomous region,” Khalil told AFP.

The Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) has been a key U.S. ally in the fight against ISIL.

They have taken heavy losses in a campaign now nearing its conclusion, with the jihadists confined to an ever-shrinking enclave of just 15 square kilometers (under six square miles).

But the jihadists have continued to claim attacks nationwide and abroad.

Ankara has welcomed Washington’s planned withdrawal of some 2,000 U.S. troops from Syria, but the future of Kurdish fighters has poisoned relations between the NATO allies.

On Monday, Erdogan and Trump had a telephone conversation to ease tensions after the U.S. leader threatened to “devastate” Turkey’s economy if Ankara attacked Kurdish forces in Syria, and called for a “safe zone”.

No ‘outside interference’

Turkish-backed Syrian fighters participating in a training maneuver, near the town of Tal Hajar in Syria’s Aleppo province, January 16, 2019. /VCG Photo

Erdogan said he and Trump had a “quite positive” conversation in which they spoke of “a 20-mile (30 kilometers) security zone along the Syrian border… set up by us”.

The YPG-led forces fighting IS in a statement said they would provide “necessary support to set up the safe zone” – if it came with international guarantees to “prevent any outside interference”, in an apparent reference to Turkey.

The Turkish army has launched two major operations in Syria in recent years.

In the latest, Turkish troops and their Syrian rebel allies seized the northwestern enclave of Afrin from the Kurds last year.

Critics have accused Turkish troops and their proxies of military occupation and abuses in Syrian sovereign territory.

But while Ankara has spoken of a YPG-free “security zone” under its control, analyst Mutlu Civiroglu said it was not immediately clear what the U.S. president meant by a “safe zone”, or who he thought would patrol it.

Analysts were “waiting for a clarification from Washington to see what the president really meant”, he told AFP.

The U.S. planned withdrawal has sent the Kurds scrambling to seek a new ally in Damascus, which has long rejected Kurdish self-rule.

With military backing from Russia since 2015, Syria’s regime has advanced against jihadists and rebels, and now controls almost two-thirds of the country.

A northwestern enclave held by jihadists and pockets held by Turkish troops and their allies remain beyond its reach, along with the much larger Kurdish region.

On Wednesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the Syrian government must take control of the north.

(Cover: An image grab taken from a video obtained by AFPTV shows US troops gathered at the scene of a suicide attack in the northern Syrian town of Manbij, January 16, 2019. /VCG Photo)

https://news.cgtn.com/news/3d3d774d7959444d32457a6333566d54/share_p.html
Mutlu Çiviroğlu 04:19 on January 8, 2019  

GAZETECİ/ANALİST ÇİVİROĞLU YORUMLADI “Erdoğan’ın Bolton’ı Kabul Etmemesi İki Taraf Arasındaki Sorunların Derinliğini Gösteriyor”

Washington’da yaşayan gazeteci/analist Mutlu Çiviroğlu, ABD Ulusal Güvenlik Danışmanı Bolton’ın Ankara ziyaretini ve ABD’de Trump’ın çekilme kararı sonrası yaşanan istifaları bianet’e yorumladı.

 

Washington’da yaşayan gazeteci/analist Mutlu Çiviroğlu, Trump’un ABD askerlerini Suriye’den çekme kararının ardından yaşananları, Beyaz Saray Ulusal Güvenlik Danışmanı John Bolton’ın İsrail sonrası Türkiye ziyareti öncesi yaptığı açıklamaları yorumladı.

Çiviroğlu, Erdoğan’ın Bolton’ı kabul etmemesi ve Bolton’ın Türkiye’den ayrılması üzerine röportajdan bir gün sonra bize ilettiği ek görüşte ise bunun “ABD-Türkiye arasındaki sorunların derinliğini gösterdiğini” söyledi.

Çiviroğlu, Trump’ın çekilme kararının ABD’nin kutuplaşmış ortamında tüm taraflardan tepki aldığını söylerken, ABD Genelkurmay Başkanı General Joseph Dunford ve Bolton’ın Türkiye ziyaretinde öncelikli olarak Kürtlerin konuşulacağını vurguladı. Çiviroğlu’na göre ABD ile Türkiye arasındaki ilişkiler, görünenden derin sorunlar barındırıyor.

Rusya ise Kürtlerin statüsüyle ilgili Suriye yönetimini ikna etme aşamasında.

Bolton’ın Türkiye ziyaretini nasıl değerlendiriyorsunuz? Ziyaret öncesi İsrail’de Kürtlerle ilgili uyarıda bulunacağını söyledi. ABD benzeri yönde başka söylemlerde de bulundu, bunlar mı görüşülüyor şu anda?

Bolton’ın Türkiye ziyareti, İsrail’den Türkiye’ye geçmesi önemli. Trump’ın üç hafta önce aniden aldığı Suriye’den çekilme kararının takip edilmesi, görüşülmesi açısından önemli öncelikle.

Çünkü o kararın yankıları hala sürüyor, hem ABD kamuoyunda, hem Trump yönetimi içerisinde, hem kongrede, hem senatoda, think tank’lerde yarattığı tartışma süregeliyor.

Trump’ın Erdoğan ile yaptığı telefon görüşmesinde bir bakıma IŞİD ile savaşı Türkiye’ye havale etme niyetiyle bu kararı almış olabileceği ABD basınında sıkça dile getirildi.

Bolton’ın ziyareti bu telefon görüşmesinde tartışılan konuların daha somut bir şekilde tartışılması hem de Türkiye’nin olası rolünün, rolü olursa nasıl olacağının konuşulması bakımından önemli.

“ABD’deki tüm kutuplar çekilme kararını eleştiriyor”

Ama en önemli konu Kürtler’e bakış açısı. Amerikan kamuoyunda çok büyük bir rahatsızlık var. Trump’ın kararının askerlere danışılmadan aldığı, Kürtler’i yüz üstü bıraktığı, Kürtlerin ABD’nin müttefiki olduğu, kimsenin ortaya çıkmadığı bir dönemde IŞİD ile savaştıkları hem Demokratlar hem Cumhuriyetçiler tarafından dile getiriliyor.

ABD gibi kutuplu bir toplumda her iki kesim de bu eleştirileri getiriyor.

Özellikle Trump’a getirilen eleştiri Kürtler üzerinden yoğunlaşmakta. Cumhuriyetçi Senatör Marco Rubio’nun “Bu karar yeni yetişmekte oluşan Kürt gençleri ABD’ye karşı nefretle dolduracaktır. Bizim yaptığımız Kürtler’e ihanettir” gibi bir açıklama yaptı.

Senatör Lindsey Graham’ın başını çektiği grup, Demokratlar da var içinde, genel olarak kamuoyu bu ani çekilme kararının Kürtler’i Erdoğan’a karşı çok savunmasız bırakacağını düşünüyor.

Türkiye’nin operasyonuyla karşı karşıya bırakmanın savunulamaz olduğu düşünülüyor.

Geçenlerde John Kirby (Pentagon Eski Sözcüsü) CNN’e yaptığı açıklamada, Türkiye’nin Afrin’deki insan hakları ihlallerine vurgu yaparak aynısının olabileceğini ifade etmişti.

ABD’deki bu hassasiyetle ilgili konuşulması, Türkiye’nin Kürtler’e, Kürtler’in kontrolündeki bölgelere karşı herhangi bir operasyon yapmaması gerektiği vurgulanabilir bu buluşmada.

Pompeo da geçenlerde “Kürtlerin katledilmesinin önüne geçilmeli” gibi güçlü bir kelime kullandı. Pompeo ve Bolton hükümet içerisinde İran karşıtı, Türkiye’ye karşı sert tutumları olan isimler.

Bolton’ın asıl amacı Kürtler konusunda ABD’nin hassasiyetini göstermek. ABD hükümetine dayatılan, bu çekilme kararının yaratacağı olası sonuçların iletilmesi konusunda önemli.

Bolton’dan önce de Graham gibi TRump’a yakın isimler bu çekilmenin zamana yayılacağı konusunda ipucu vermekteler.

O nedenle ABD’nin bu konuda ısrarcı olacağını söylemek pek de hayalci olmaz.

“Çekilme konusu bulanık”

Çekilme konusu giderek bulanıklaşmaya başladı, ya da öyle mi yansıtılıyor? Çekilme kararı sonrası inisiyatif Türkiye’ye ne kadar kalır? Bugün Trump’ın “Türkiye bizim kadar olmasa da IŞİD’den nefret ediyor” şeklinde bir başka ‘tuhaf’ açıklaması da oldu?

Çekilme konusu tabii bulanık. Trump kamuoyunda her aklına geleni söylemesiyle tanınan bir başkan. Kendi muhalifleri bunu “Refleksle hareket eden bir başkan” olarak isimlendirip, tepki gösteriyorlar.

Zaten Mattis’in, McGurk ve Sweney’in istifaları bu kararın hükümetin kararı olmadığını, bireysel bir karar olduğunu ortaya koyuyor. Üç haftalık süreç içerisinde bu daha iyi görüldü.

Trump’ın etrafında politikayı belirleyen isimlerin ağırlıklarını koymasıyla beraber Trump da bu noktada sinyaller verdi, “Ben takvim vermemiştim” şeklinde açıklamaları oldu. Yani bu çekilme açıklamasıyla ilgili “damage control” (hasar kontrol) çalışmaları sürmekte ama çekilme Trump’ın seçim kampanyasında da belirttiği bir konuydu. Danışılmadan yapılması tepki yarattı. Ama bu siyasetten dönülüyor, çekilinse bile bazı birliklerin daha uzun süre kalacağı da konuşuluyor. Böyle bir opsiyon muhtemel.

Öte yandan Türkiye’nin Suriye’de IŞİD’e karşı rol oynayacağını, konunun uzmanları dahil hiç kimse anlayabilmiş değil. Çünkü IŞİD’in şu anda bulunduğu nokta ile Türkiye arasındaki sınır yüzlerce kilometre.

“IŞİD ile mücadelenin Türkiye’ye bırakılması gerçekçi değil”

Buradan geçmesi için Suriye Demokratik Güçleri’nin (SDG) kontrol ettiği yerlerden geçmesi lazım ki bu ne pratik ne de gerçekçi.

Ayrıca zaten YPG’nin başını çektiği SDG, IŞİD’e karşı çok yoğun bir savaş sürdürmekte. En son Cumartesi günkü çatışmada iki İngiliz askeri yaralandı. Yani İngiliz askeri ve SDG yan yana savaşıyor IŞİD’e karşı, bu da önemli bir ayrıntı.

Yani böyle bir şey varken Türkiye’nin IŞİD’e karşı rol almasını beklemek gerçekçi değil, zaten Washington’da da bunun pek karşılığı yok. ABD basınında da birkaç gündür Türkiye’nin maddi ve manevi taleplerle böyle bir hava yaratması eleştiriliyor.

“Kürtlerin talepleri rol sahibi olmak”

Kürtler ve Esad’ın yaz aylarından beri gündeme gelen anlaşma iddialarını nasıl değerlendiriyorsunuz? Bölgede kartlar yeniden karılıyor klişesi şu an için geçerli mi?

Kürtler Suriye’nin bir parçasılar, Suriye’deki en büyük etnik azınlıklar. Suriye’nin en güçsüz olduğu zamanda bile hiç Suriye’yi terk etmeyi düşünmediler.

Kendi projeleri hep Suriye dahilinde kendi federasyonlarının olması, yani yerel yönetimlerinin güçlendirilmesi. Şam’daki demir yumruğun kaldırılması, insanların kendi kimliği, kendi renkleriyle yaşamasına izin verilmesi.

O nedenle de mümkün olduğu kadar Suriye hükümetiyle çatışmadan çekinildi, yeri geldi Halep gibi bazı bölgelerde destek de sunuldu.

Gelinen noktada Suriye hükümeti, Suriye’nin meşru yönetimi, o sebeple Kürtler her zaman Suriye hükümetiyle anlaşmadan yana, ama benim Rojava’daki siyasiler, askeri temsilciler ve sıradan insanlarla yaptığım görüşmelerde rejimden bir değişim beklendiği, rejimin Kürtler’in Suriye’nin toprak bütünlüğüne katkılarının takdir edilmesi gerektiği, IŞİD, El Nusra ve benzeri cihatçı örgütlere karşı savaşının görülmesi, Kürtler ve müttefiklerinin taleplerine saygı gösterilmesi, yerine getirilmesi gibi talepler var.

Ancak hükümette geçen sekiz yıllık savaşa, yıkıma rağmen fazla olumlu değişiklik görülmüyor. Kürtlerin istemlerine olumlu yaklaşılmamakla birlikte sert tepkiler veriliyor.

Kürtlerin istediği Suriye’nin geleceğinde rol sahibi olmak. Malumunuz Kürtler onlarca yıldır ülkenin en büyük azınlığı olarak her türlü haktan mahrum olarak yaşadılar.

Kürtler artık bunu kabul etmek istemiyor, bunun böyle olmaması gerektiğini söylüyor. Kürtlerin on bine yakın kadın ve erkek kayıpları var, özellikle bu cihatçılara karşı.

Kürtlerin istediği kendi dillerinin, varlıklarının anayasal güvence altına alınması, kendi bölgelerini kendilerinin yönetmesi. Kürtlerin, Süryanilerin, bölgedeki Arapların, Ezidi Kürtlerin istemi bu.

“Rusya Suriye yönetimini ikna ediyor”

Eğer Suriye hükümeti biraz geçmişten ders çıkarırsa, Suriye’nin çok renkli, kültürlü yapısına bağlı olarak Kürtlerin isteklerine önem verirse sorunlar çözülmeyecek gibi değil. Benim gördüğüm hükümet bugüne kadar buna yanaşmamaktaydı. Ama son dönemlerde bu tür görüşmeler devam ediyor.

Rusya’nın da ara bulucu olduğu konusunda görüşler var. Rusya’nın kendisi de federasyon yönetimi. Suriye yönetimini ikna etmeye yakın olduğu yorumları yapılmakta. O nedenle Kürtler ve Esad’ın oturup konuşması sürpriz değil. Bu da olumlu bir şey. Suriye sekiz yıldan beri çok büyük bir yıkım yaşadı. Binlerce insan öldü, milyonlarcası evinden barkından oldu.

“ABD-Türkiye ilişkileri iyileşmedi”

Brunson krizinin ardından yaşanan iki ülke açısından tamamen ‘iyileşen’ ilişkiler dönemi mi, bu İran ile ne kadar bağlantılı?

Tamamen iyileşen ilişkiler olduğuna katılmıyorum. Amerika ve Türkiye arasında çok ciddi sorunlar var. Bu sorunlar da kolay kolay çözülecek sorunlar değil. Çünkü ciddi.

İran bunun sadece bir bağlamı. Kürtler konusu, Suriye konusu, İran, Halkbank, S-400 füzeleri, pek çok sorun var. Bu kolay kolay çözülmez ama Trump’ın Brunson’dan sonra baskıyı hafiflettiği görülüyor.

Bu çekilme konusunda Trump’ın Erdoğan ile yaptığı konuşma sonrası ABD medyası bu konuda hem fikir. ABD kamuoyu da çekilme kararında Erdoğan’ın rolü olduğuna inanıyor. Ama öte yandan Bolton’ın Türkiye’ye olumsuz bir bakış açısı da, Pompeo’nun bakan olmadan önce yaptığı açıklamalar da biliniyor.

Hükümet içerisinde Trump gibi düşünmeyen insanlar olduğu da biliniyor. Türkiye’nin cihatçılara karşı yeterince çaba göstermediği, Türkiye’nin Kürtlere karşı sert politikalar yürüttüğü, şu anda da asıl amacının IŞİD ile savaş olmadığı, Kürtler’i ezmek olduğu dile getiriliyor. Böyle bakıldığında temiz bir sayfa açılmış değil.

İran önemli, Bolton ve Pompeo’nun başını çektiği grup İran’a politikaların sertleşmesi gerektiğine inanıyorlar. Türkiye’nin de İran ilişkileri biliniyor. Orta vadede ben ilişkilerin iyi olacağı ya da şu anda iyileştiği fikrine katılmıyorum. (PT)

http://bianet.org/bianet/siyaset/204231-erdogan-in-bolton-i-kabul-etmemesi-iki-taraf-arasindaki-sorunlarin-derinligini-gosteriyor

Mutlu Çiviroğlu 23:43 on January 5, 2019  

Syrian Kurds deny Trump’s claim they sell oil to Iran

Syrian Kurds deny Trump’s claim they sell oil to IranSyrian workers fix pipes from an oil well at an oil field controlled by a US-backed Kurdish group in Rmeilan, March, 27, 2018. (Photo: Associated Press)

 

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Salih Muslim, the former co-chairman of the Democratic Union Party (PYD), denied claims made by US President Donald Trump that Syrian Kurds have sold oil to Iran.

During a cabinet meeting on Wednesday, Trump said he was not happy that the Kurds are selling oil to Iran.

“I didn’t like the fact that [the Kurds] are selling the small oil that they have to Iran, and we asked them not to do it,” the US president stated.

It was not entirely clear whether Trump was referring to the Syrian Kurds or the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq.

Speaking to Kurdish journalist Mutlu Civiroglu, Muslim rejected the American leader’s claims and said there is only local use of oil by Kurds in Syria.

“I asked our people here in the administration, in the YPG [People’s Protection Units], and the others, and they said there are no sales of oil to any side outside of Syria,” the former PYD head said.

The Syrian Kurds have no borders with Iran to sell oil to them, Muslim added, “there is no way, everybody should know the reality.”

Muslim suggested Trump was referring to “other Kurds” because “Syrian Kurds have no relations with Iran.”

“We have no deal, nor sales of oil [with] them, not at all,” he said. “Maybe others are doing so, but that’s not our business.”

According to Çeleng Omer, a former university lecturer from Afrin with expertise on oil, while Iran produces four million barrels per day (bpd), Syria’s production before the war was 400,000 bpd, which equals 10 percent of Iranian oil production.

According to Omer, oil production in Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) areas in northeastern Syria is only 50,000 barrels. He said this quantity is “consumed locally by refining it in primitive refineries,” adding that Trump may have “confused the Kurds in Syria, with those in Iraq.”

“There is no border between the Syrian Kurdish region with Iran, and the oil produced in their areas is not enough to satisfy local needs, and the war destroyed a large part of the oil fields” which need to be restored before being exported, Omer explained.

“The oil produced in SDF areas meets the needs of fuel in the domestic market only.”

Nicholas A. Heras,  a Fellow at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), said: “Trump’s statement could mean a couple of things.”

“One, he declassified hitherto classified info about the extent of YPG-Iranian relations in Syria. Or two, he mixed up talking points in his head from an earlier conversation with Turkey about Kurds in Iraq and Syria.”

Meanwhile, Alan Mohtadi, head of T&S Consulting Energy and Security, told Kurdistan 24 he is certain President Trump confused the Syrian Kurds with Kurds in Iraq.

Mohtadi explained that Syrian Kurdistan produces between 30-40,000 bpd, adding that almost all of the oil is used for local consumption.

“They would need to produce three to four times more, get a decent transport route (the border with the Kurdistan Region is tightly controlled), and transport it via trucks to Iran,” he said.

“This is not profitable and logistically almost impossible.”

The KRG announced in November that oil exports to Iran stopped after a new round of US sanctions were enforced.

Wladimir van Wilgenburg

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany

 

https://www.kurdistan24.net/en/news/0b078a0a-836e-4564-aaaf-c0d30add8307

Mutlu Çiviroğlu 03:37 on December 24, 2018  

Order signed to withdraw US troops from Syria

US forces patrol northern SyriaUS forces patrolling in northeastern Syria near the Turkey border for the second time in three days, November 4, 2018. Image: @mustefa2bali/Twitter

The order to withdraw American troops from Syria has been signed, the U.S. military said Sunday, December 24, after President Donald Trump and his Turkish counterpart agreed to prevent a power vacuum in the wake of the controversial move.

The announcement that U.S. troops would leave Syria – where they have been deployed to assist in the multinational fight against Islamic State – shocked global partners and American politicians alike.

“The execute order for Syria has been signed,” a U.S. military spokesperson told AFP when asked about the withdrawal order, without providing further details.

Turkey was a rare ally that lauded Trump’s momentous decision on Syria, a country where it will now have a freer rein to target the People’s Protection Units (YPG), U.S.-allied fighters who have played a major role in the war against ISIS but are deemed terrorists by Ankara.

Trump and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan spoke by telephone on Sunday and “agreed to ensure coordination between their countries’ military, diplomatic and other officials to avoid a power vacuum which could result following any abuse of the withdrawal and transition phase in Syria,” the Turkish presidency said in a statement.

Late Sunday, Trump tweeted that Erdogan had assured him that any remaining ISIS fighters in Syria will be eliminated.

“President @RT_Erdogan of Turkey has very strongly informed me that he will eradicate whatever is left of ISIS in Syria,” Trump said in a tweet around midnight Sunday.

Trump added that Erdogan “is a man who can do it.”

The U.S. president concluded: “Our troops are coming home!”

Hours earlier, Trump had tweeted that he and Erdogan “discussed ISIS, our mutual involvement in Syria, & the slow & highly coordinated pullout of U.S. troops from the area.”

U.S. politicians, including those from his own Republican party, and international allies fear the withdrawal of the roughly 2,000 U.S. troops is premature and would further destabilize the already devastated region.

A U.S. withdrawal, said Mutlu Civiroglu, a Kurdish affairs analyst, will open the way “for Turkey to start its operations against the Kurds, and a bloody war will begin.”

Turkey considers the predominantly-Kurdish YPG, which forms the core of the multiethnic Syrian Democratic Forces, inextricable from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which is designated a terrorist group by Ankara and its Western allies.

But the YPG is not a proscribed organization in the European Union, United Kingdom or United States, and U.S. defense officials have publicly supported the group due its unique capabilities in battling Islamic State as part of the U.S.-backed SDF.

French President Emmanuel Macron on Sunday said he “deeply regretted” Trump’s decision, and that “an ally must be reliable.”

Two top leaders of the political arm of the SDF, the Syrian Democratic Council, visited France on Friday for talks on the U.S. military withdrawal from Syria and Turkey’s threats to launch a military operation.

New Pentagon chief

U.S. troops will leave under the auspices of a new Pentagon chief set to start next month, after Jim Mattis resigned from the post citing key differences, including on Syria, with the often-impulsive Trump.

Several U.S. politicians from both parties rejected Trump’s claim that ISIS had been defeated, and the decision also caused alarm and dismay in the U.S. military over the prospect of suddenly abandoning Washington’s Kurdish partners.

Trump’s sudden decision sparked turmoil within his administration, prompting the resignation of Brett McGurk, the special envoy to the anti-ISIS coalition, as well as Mattis.

Plans for the troop withdrawal will now be overseen by Deputy Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan, who Trump on Sunday said would replace Mattis starting January 1.

Mattis, 68, had said he would leave at the end of February to allow a smooth transition for the next chief of the world’s top military power – but a reportedly angry Trump accelerated his departure by two months.

Defense spokesperson Dana White tweeted that Mattis would still assist in the handover, working with Shanahan to ensure the department “remains focused on the defense of our nation during this transition.”

According to U.S. media, Trump voiced resentment over news coverage of Mattis’ stinging resignation letter that laid bare his fundamental disagreements with the president.

Days later, special envoy McGurk made a similar move, saying he could not support Trump’s Syria decision that, he said, “left our coalition partners confused and our fighting partners bewildered.”

Unlike Mattis, Shanahan has never served in the military and has spent most of his career in the private sector.

He spent over three decades working for aircraft giant Boeing, including as vice president and general manager of Boeing Missile Defense Systems, before moving to the Pentagon as deputy in 2017.

Until Trump finds a permanent Pentagon chief, Shanahan will lead plans for US troops to leave Syria along with a significant drawdown in Afghanistan, both of which critics worry will leave war-torn regions at risk of continued and potentially heightened bloodshed.

STAFF WRITER

Order signed to withdraw US troops from Syria

Mutlu Çiviroğlu 00:41 on December 24, 2018  

Trump says he discussed ‘highly coordinated’ Syria pullout with Erdogan

French President Emmanuel Macron says, “I deeply regret the decision” by Trump to pull troops from Syria
Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, left, with US President Donald Trump at G20 summit in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on 1 December (AFP)

 

Donald Trump said on Sunday he had discussed Syria and “the slow & highly coordinated pullout of U.S. troops from the area” in a phone call with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

The US president tweeted that the two leaders had “a long and productive call,” and also discussed the Islamic State (IS) group and “heavily expanded trade,” AFP reported.

Trump shocked US allies on Friday when he announced plans to pull the 2,000 US troops out of Syria, where they have been helping coordinate a multinational fight against IS. On Sunday, a US military spokesperson said the order for their withdrawal had been signed, without providing further details.

French President Emmanuel Macron criticised Trump’s decision, saying “an ally must be reliable”. In a sign of the growing diplomatic rift between the two leaders, Macron said: “I deeply regret the decision” by Trump to pull out US troops.

Still, the move was lauded by Turkey.

The decision followed an earlier Trump phone call with Erdogan, who has been pressing for a US withdrawal.

The Turkish presidency said in a statement: “The two leaders agreed to ensure coordination between their countries’ military, diplomatic and other officials to avoid a power vacuum which could result following any abuse of the withdrawal and transition phase in Syria.”

Erdogan had said on Friday that Turkey would take over the fight against IS in Syria as the US withdraws.

An American pullout would also allow Turkish troops to move against the hardened Kurdish fighters in Syria deemed terrorists by the Ankara government – but who have strongly supported US efforts there.

A US withdrawal, said Mutlu Civiroglu, a Kurdish affairs analyst, “will open way for Turkey to start its operations against the Kurds, and a bloody war will begin”.

Trump’s sudden decision sparked turmoil in his administration, prompting the resignation of Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, to be effective on 28 February, as well as of Brett McGurk, the special envoy to the anti-IS coalition.

In announcing his resignation, Mattis distributed a candid resignation letter addressed to Trump that laid bare the growing divide between them, and implicitly criticized Trump for failing to value America’s closest allies, who fought alongside the United States in both conflicts. Mattis said that Trump deserved to have a defense secretary more aligned with his views, Reuters reported.

Trump on Sunday said he would be replacing Mattis two months earlier than specified in his resignation, a move officials said was driven by Trump’s anger at Mattis’s resignation letter and its rebuke of his foreign policy, Reuters reported.

Several US politicians of both parties rejected Trump’s claim that the forces of IS had been defeated, and many in the US military expressed alarm and dismay at the thought of suddenly abandoning their Kurdish allies.

Criticism continued on Sunday television news shows, according to the Wall Street Journal:

“I am deeply, deeply concerned and I oppose strongly the president’s decision apparently to withdraw troops from Syria,” Representative Liz Cheney, a Republican from Wyoming, said on CBS, also mentioning Trump’s plans to remove about half the US troops in Afghanistan.

“These two decisions would be disastrous,” Cheney said. “They would really, in many ways, hand the victories to our enemies to Iran, to ISIS in Syria, the Taliban, al Qaeda in Afghanistan.”

Incoming White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney countered on Fox News that the president had long made his intentions clear. “We recognize the fact that this is unpopular within the beltway,” he said. “We recognize this fact it’s unpopular within the Defense Department. It’s very popular with ordinary American people.”

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/trump-says-he-discussed-highly-coordinated-syria-pullout-erdogan

 

Mutlu Çiviroğlu 23:55 on December 20, 2018  

Winners and Losers in Trump’s Planned Troop Withdrawal From Syria

Kurdish residents of Amuda in northeastern Syria. One holds a flag of Abdullah Ocalan, the founder of the separatist Kurdish Workers' Party.
Credit…Mauricio Lima for The New York Times

President Trump’s decision this week to withdraw all American troops from Syria within 30 days risks leaving United States’ allies in the long-running war weakened while strengthening rivals backed by Iran and Russia.

American troops entered Syria in 2015 as part of a coalition fighting the Islamic State, which had seized large swaths of territory in Syria and Iraq. In the three years since, the extremist group’s self-declared caliphate has crumbled. But the continuing lack of stability in both Syria and Iraq could provide fertile ground for the jihadists to retrench.

The American pullout could also weaken the country’s influence over any negotiations on a settlement to end the conflict.

“The leverage that might have been there for the United States in Syria is no longer there because now everyone knows that the United States will leave Syria unconditionally,” said Joost Hiltermann, the Middle East director of the International Crisis Group, a conflict and foreign policy research organization.

Here are some of the parties to the conflict that have the most to gain or lose from an American withdrawal.

President Bashar al-Assad and his chief international backers, Russia and Iran, would all benefit from an American troop withdrawal, which would further tighten Mr. Assad’s once-tenuous grip on his battered country.

Iran is one of the biggest winners as the international ally with the most invested in Syria and the most at stake. During the war, Iran embedded itself in Syria, redrawing the strategic map of the Middle East.

It has sent in thousands of Shiite forces, who fought on the ground, and deployed drones and precision weapons to keep Mr. Assad in power. That secured an all-important land bridge through Syria to supply weapons to Hezbollah, Iran’s Shiite militia ally in Lebanon and a steadfast enemy of Israel.

Iran trained and equipped Shiite fighters while strengthening ties with allies in Iraq and Lebanon in hopes of building a united front in the event of a new war with Israel.

Russia also stands to benefit. A day after Mr. Trump’s announcement on Wednesday, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia applauded the decision, saying during a news conference, “Donald’s right, and I agree with him.”

Credit…Alexander Nemenov/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Russia contributed around 5,000 troops and a few dozen aircraft to prop up Mr. Assad’s government, which secured Moscow’s strategically important naval facility in the Syrian city of Tartus on the Mediterranean Sea. Russia also expanded its military footprint in Syria during the war.

“It certainly helps the Russians, who have benefited tremendously from a quite limited investment in Syria,” said Jon B. Alterman, director and senior fellow of the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Through its alliance with Syria, Russia has maintained its influence in the Middle East.

“They re-established themselves as a global player when the conclusion had been that the glory days of the Soviet Union were dead and gone,” Mr. Alterman said.

For Mr. Assad, the American withdrawal means the path forward for Syria will be shaped largely by forces sympathetic to his government and its interests.

The two biggest threats to his leadership have been substantially neutralized — the myriad rebel groups that tried to overthrow the Syrian government and the Islamic State — the latter thanks largely to the military force brought to bear by the American-led international coalition that fought the militants.

Turkey and the United States, NATO allies, have frequently found themselves at odds in Syria, even though both opposed Mr. Assad. That is because the United States backed a mostly Kurdish force in Syria, saying they were the fighters most capable of pushing back the Islamic State.

Turkey has long battled Kurdish separatists at home in the country’s southeast and saw the rising power of Kurds along its border in northern Syria as a threat. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey recently threatened military intervention against the Kurdish forces in Syria that Washington has backed since 2015.

The exit of American troops would leave Turkey open to taking action to curb the power of Kurdish forces in Syria.

Credit…Bulent Kilic/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

“We have won against ISIS,” Mr. Trump declared in a video that was published on Wednesday. But experts, including some of Mr. Trump’s own staff and coalition partners, disagree.

Though the militants retain just 1 percent of the territory they held at the height of power, this would remove a major military adversary in the region. During a State Department briefing on Dec. 11, Brett McGurk, Mr. Trump’s special envoy in the fight against the Islamic State, said the battle was not over.

“The end of ISIS will be a much more long-term initiative,” Mr. McGurk said. “Nobody is declaring a mission accomplished.”

Despite being America’s key allies in the fight against the Islamic State, the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces are being virtually abandoned, critics of the withdrawal say. The Kurds have relied on American support, and a sudden withdrawal could be disastrous, leaving them exposed from all sides.

The Syrian Democratic Forces denounced the withdrawal in a statement on Thursday.

“The White House’s decision to withdraw from northern and eastern Syria will negatively affect the campaign against terrorism,” the group said. “The fight against terrorism is not over yet, and the final defeat of terrorism has not come yet.”

The group warned that the move would create a “political-military vacuum” that would allow the Islamic State to thrive again.

Kurdish forces are likely to lose territory and control as a result of Mr. Trump’s decision.

“Kurds and their allies have paid a very heavy price,” said Mutlu Civiroglu, a Washington-based Kurdish affairs analyst. “They have fought on the front line, and thousands of Kurdish men and women lost their lives fighting on behalf of the entire world.”

He said many now feel betrayed: “They feel like all the efforts are about to go in vain.”

Kurdish fighters who have battled the Islamic State in Syria.
Credit…Mauricio Lima for The New York Times

As the Kurds — a stateless and often marginalized group — took back territory from Islamic State forces in northern Syria, they worked to created an autonomous region.

A newly empowered Iran with unfettered land access to their Hezbollah allies — without American forces in the north of Syria as a counterweight — poses an existential threat to Israel.

“Israel will be very unhappy about this because they see it as a net gain for Iran, and they are right,” Mr. Hiltermann said.

As Israel’s most powerful ally, the United States plays an outsize role in security for the country, and the withdrawal of troops could threaten that balance.

Civilians have borne the brunt of the conflict in Syria for years, with millions displaced from their homes and millions more who fled the country struggling abroad as refugees.

Aid groups warn that further destabilization of northern Syrian could spark yet another humanitarian disaster in the region.

A paramedic carried an injured child after Syrian and Russian forces struck the rebel-held town of Hamouria.
Credit…Abdulmonam Eassa/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

The International Rescue Committee, which has been working to provide humanitarian assistance in parts of Syria for years, warned that a potential Turkish offensive in the region could be devastating.

“Throughout this conflict, these political and military decisions have been made without any apparent consideration of the humanitarian consequences. As a result, every decision has heightened the danger and distress for civilians,” said David Miliband, president of the International Rescue Committee.

Many Kurdish civilians would likely flee the area if the Kurdish militias lose control of northern Syria.

“There will be a humanitarian crisis, there is no question,” Mr. Hiltermann said.

By Megan Specia

Mutlu Çiviroğlu 03:11 on November 29, 2018  

How long will Turkey stay in Syria?

In recent months, Turkey has made significant investments in areas under its control in northern Syria, launching local employment projects, opening Turkish post offices and even building a new highway linking the Syrian city of Al-Bab to Turkey. These commitments indicate that Ankara seeks a significant role in shaping the future of northern Syria, an area of great strategic importance.

Turkey currently controls a large swathe of territory in northwestern Syria consisting of Al-Bab and the border cities of Jarablus and Azaz, captured from Islamic State (ISIS) in the Euphrates Shield operation it launched in August 2016. It also occupies the enclave of Afrin, situated a little further westward of the Euphrates Shield zone, which it captured from Syrian Kurdish forces in its Olive Branch operation early this year.

Earlier this month, Turkish media highlighted several new projects launched by Ankara. It began training 6,500 more of the proxy militiamen who fight on Turkey’s behalf under the banner of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) in Azaz. Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu announced that 260,000 Syrian refugees had successfully resettled there. Turkey also supplied 3.6 million textbooks to Syrian schools and drilled 69 wells to provide water for 432,000 people. A business association head also announced that 4,000 Turkish firms were operating in both the Euphrates Shield zone and Afrin.

State-run Turkish news outlets have a clear motive in extolling Turkey’s more humanitarian endeavours. Nevertheless, such reports demonstrate a clear intention on Ankara’s part to consolidate its sizeable foothold in northern Syria.

“The head is Turkish, the body Syrian,” quipped one Syrian man when describing all the various institutions, ranging from the security and police forces to the local councils that Turkey has established in the areas it controls. ‘Brotherhood has no borders’ is also a slogan inscribed on those Turkish-built institutions in both Turkish and Arabic. While such anecdotal examples may indicate that Turkey seeks to gradually annex these territories, Ankara invariably stresses that it supports preserving Syria’s territorial integrity.

Turkey’s two operations into Syria did fulfil some of its security needs. ISIS no longer has a foothold on Turkey’s border thanks to Euphrates Shield, and Olive Branch fulfilled Ankara’s goal of preventing the Syrian Kurds from taking over all of Syria’s northern border. Remaining in Syria, or at least retaining a sizeable proxy FSA presence there, will help ensure these battlefield victories are not undone.

“Turkish actions in northern Syria are driven by security concerns,” Timur Akhmetov, a Middle East analyst at the Russian International Affairs Council, told Ahval News.

“To enhance its chances there, Turkey supports a military presence by providing limited humanitarian assistance. It is not, however, feasible at the moment to see if such investments will be guaranteed by the main actors in Syria, such as Damascus, or whether they will result in pro-Turkish sentiments in the long-run.”

The Syrian regime, which has retaken most of the country, has staunchly opposed Turkey’s cross-border incursions since the start of Euphrates Shield. Russia has proven more tolerant of the Turkish military presence, but is unlikely to recognise or acquiesce to any potential Turkish annexation of Syrian territory.

“Turkey is trying to convert its presence into political influence, but Russia so far has clearly signalled to Turkey that the Turkish presence in northern Syria is tolerated due to Turkish security concerns, meaning that no political claims are recognised as legitimate by the Astana agreements,” Akhmetov said.

Akhmetov compared Turkey’s presence in Syria to Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon to remove the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) from the south of the country next to its border. For much of the next 18 years, it controlled a swathe of southern Lebanon alongside a proxy army called the South Lebanon Army (SLA) that, much like the Turkish-backed FSA forces today, it armed and trained to help enforce a buffer zone in that area, before finally withdrawing in 2000.

As with most analogies, there are some important distinctions between this ongoing case and that historic case.

“I’m not sure if the best way to look at it is in terms of legal annexation,” said Tony Badran, a research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington-based think tank. “These areas have been a direct Turkish sphere of influence, and have been getting more and more integrated into Turkish administration. In many ways, for historical, political and cultural reasons, that goes well beyond what Israel had in southern Lebanon.”

Badran, like Akhmetov, sees Russia as the primary player in determining how long this situation lasts.

“For as long as the status quo between Turkey and Russia persists, and the limitations on the Assad regime’s manpower and capabilities continue to be an obstacle to its territorial ambitions, then I suspect this arrangement is likely to remain in its current, de facto, form,” Badran said.

While the Euphrates Shield zone has proven relatively stable and secure under Turkish control, the same cannot be said about Turkish-occupied Afrin.

“When you look at Afrin today there is no stability or security, it is just chaos,” Mutlu Çiviroğlu, a Kurdish and Syria affairs analyst, told Ahval News.

“Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the U.N. Human Rights Commission all state that human rights violations, torture, kidnapping and looting are common in today’s Afrin. This was a region which had exemplary stability and was a refuge for many thousands of displaced people. A place where Kurds and Arabs, Muslims and Yezidis and so on coexisted.”

Çiviroğlu said most of Afrin’s residents had been displaced by Turkey’s invasion while Ankara has facilitated the resettlement of many Syrians from across the country there, sparking accusations that it is working to alter Afrin’s Kurdish-majority demographics.

This month, clashes in Afrin between Turkish-backed factions have left at least 25 dead and bode ill for Ankara’s claims to have brought stability to the tiny enclave. “The clashes provoked terror among civilians,” said the head of the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights Rami Abdul Rahman, who summed them up as “unprecedented since the rebels seized Afrin”.

Çiviroğlu said that since Turkey is the “occupying power” in Afrin it had the responsibility to maintain stability and security, both of which Afrin has been chronically lacking.

“Turkey’s argument of removing terrorists from that region and bringing stability and security rings hollow,” he said, adding that Turkey’s occupation of Afrin is an attempt to “expand the territories under its control to use as a bargaining chip for negotiations so it can have more of a say over Syria’s future.”

Paul Iddon

https://ahvalnews.com/syrian-war/how-long-will-turkey-stay-syria