Syrian Kurds Prepare For Self-Governance
The PKK-affiliated Democratic Union Party is consulting the political parties of the Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq on plans to form an interim government for Kurdish-controlled enclaves in Syria.
The Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), which is close to the rebel Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), has proposed a plan to form an interim administration within three months, a referendum on a draft constitution and parliamentary elections within six months.
Rumors suggested that the PYD would announce their autonomy project officially on July 19. On this day, the PYD commemorates the one-year anniversary of the withdrawal of Assad's forces from nine Kurdish-dominated towns. The PYD controls most of the Kurdish areas apart from Assad-controlled Qamishli and some mixed cities and towns in the provinces of Hasakah and Aleppo.
The public announcement of the plan follows the death of six demonstrators in the border town of Amuda in a clash between the People’s Defense Units and Kurdish protesters on June 27, which again proved the weakness of the political agreements between the PYD and rival Kurdish political parties. Moreover, it coincides with recent fighting that erupted between al-Qaeda proxies and the Defense Units over control of oil-rich Hasakah province.
Before and after the incident there were several meetings between the PYD and the two ruling parties in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. The PYD met with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani’s Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and Kurdistan’s regional President Massoud Barzani’s Kurdistan Democratic Party and also some of the opposition parties. Moreover, there were meetings in Syria between the Kurdish parties.
