The head of the Syrian Kurdish YPG militant organisation said that, provided they managed to secure the rights of the Kurdish people, then they would have “no problem” with the Syrian Ba’athist regime who has spent decades killing and subjugating the Kurds.
The YPG forms the military backbone of autonomous enclaves carved out by Kurdish groups in northern Syria since the start of the conflict in 2011. Its deepening influence has prompted Turkey to intervene in Syria to prevent further Kurdish gains.
Read: 42 killed in airstrike on mosque near Aleppo in Syria
The Kurds, systematically persecuted for years by the Syrian state, say their aim is not independence, but regional autonomy in a negotiated settlement to the war.
Sipan Hemo, the YPF commander, said the YPG’s political goal was “guaranteeing the rights of the Kurdish people in Syria legally, constitutionally”.
[If the YPG gains what it wants] then there will be no problem with the regime, despite the military confrontations that happened before.
Syrian dictator Bashar Al-Assad has previously opposed the idea of federalism, and says that his regime will reclaim all of Syria.
In recent weeks the Russian and Iran-backed Syrian army staged an advance through Daesh-held areas to reach the frontier with areas held by a YPG-allied militia, the Manbij Military Council, suggesting at least a tacit understanding and at most outright cooperation.
Part of the evidence suggesting cooperation between the Assad regime and the YPG are that the leftist militant group still controls districts of Aleppo, which is otherwise in regime hands, while the Assad regime operates an airport in the city of Qamishli, which is in YPG hands.
Raqqa attack to be in April
Hemo also said a US-backed assault to drive Daesh from its de facto capital Raqqa would begin at the start of April and the YPG would be taking part, despite fierce opposition from neighbouring Turkey.
A spokesman for the US Pentagon, Navy Captain Jeff Davis, said no decision had been made yet on the Raqqa offensive, which is part of a two pronged attempt to dismantle the caliphate declared by Daesh in parts of Syria and Iraq in 2014.
Read: US-coalition strikes near Syria’s Raqqa city kill 14
US-backed forces, including the YPG, are closing in on the city and President Donald Trump has said he wants to accelerate efforts to crush the hardline militants, who are under siege by US and Iran-backed Iraqi forces in the much larger city of Mosul.
The comments by Hemo were made to Reuters, and were the first indication of a date of an attack.
In a written reply to questions, Hemo, who rarely, if ever, appears in the media, said:
Regarding the decision to liberate Raqqa and storm it, the matter is decided and at the start of the month of April the military operation will begin. We believe that liberating Raqqa will not take more than a number weeks.
Ankara has been pressing the United States to drop its military alliance with the Syrian Kurdish group, which it views as part of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) that has been fighting an insurgency for three decades in Turkey, claiming tens of thousands of lives, mostly civilians.
The role of the YPG is a major point of contention between the United States and its NATO ally Turkey, which wants Washington to draw instead on Syrian Arab opposition groups backed by Ankara for the final assault on Raqqa, a predominantly Arab city.
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told broadcaster Haberturk in an interview late on Thursday that parts of the US military favoured incorporating the YPG into the assault force because of its earlier successes on the ground.
The US-led coalition last week announced that a Marines artillery unit had been deployed to Syria to help accelerate the campaign to defeat Daesh in Raqqa, adding to some 500 US forces already in Syria.
A second Kurdish military source said:
It is clear that American forces are increasing in numbers and equipment in northern Syria with the aim of creating a strategic balance and giving more momentum to the Raqqa battle and what comes after it. This momentum is subject to increase as the actual date for the battle of Raqqa draws near at the start of April.
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