Clashes erupted on April 4 between the Kurdish People’s Defense Units (YPG) and Syrian government forces in Qamishli, the unofficial capital of the Kurdish-dominated areas of northern Syria. They were the first such clashes in that city, still under the control of the Bashar al-Assad regime, in Hasakah province.

According to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, three members of the YPG were killed after government forces attacked a “YPG checkpoint by the al-Basil roundabout by the Qamishli airport highway.” A while later, at least three members of the Syrian security services were killed and seven captured when YPG militiamen attacked two checkpoints at entrances to Qamishli. The violence complicates an already chaotic situation in Syria’s Kurdish regions.

The Observatory also reported, “It is worth mentioning that this is the first attack by Syrian regular forces on a YPG checkpoint in Hasakah province. The YPG is in control of most of the Syrian Kurdish cities and towns of Hasakah and Aleppo provinces. The YPG has attacked a regular forces checkpoint in the Sheikh Maqsoud neighbourhood of Aleppo, leading to the death of seven regular forces.”

Zuhat Kobani, representative in Europe of the Democratic Union Party (PYD), with which the YPG is affiliated, told Al-Monitor, “Today clashes erupted between the forces of YPG and forces of the regime on the airport road. The dead and the wounded are not clear yet. According to the initial news, two YPG fighters were killed, but there are no accurate figures yet because all of them have been taken to the hospital.” Avend Kurdistani, an activist with the Kurdish Youth Movement (TCK), informed Al-Monitor that seven Syrian soldiers allegedly had been killed in the clash in Qamishli.