Iraqi Kurds seize control of key Syria border crossing

ERBIL, Iraq — Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga forces have seized most of the borders that divide the landlocked Kurds between Iraq and Syria, with increasing public support from both sides of the border. Kurds in several cities in Syria rallied in support of the Kurdish fighters that are engaging the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) both in Syria and Iraq, but unity between rival Kurdish parties is no guarantee.

Peshmerga forces affiliated with the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) of Kurdistan Regional Government President Massoud Barzani secured most of the Iraqi-Syrian border areas of the province of Mosul on June 10 after the fall of the city to ISIS.

Importantly, they have secured most areas surrounding the previously Iraqi-controlled Rabia-Yaroubia border crossing. The Yaroubia crossing was captured by the Democratic Union Party (PYD), which is affiliated with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), in October 2013 in cooperation with the Iraqi government to circumvent the Turkish and KDP border closures between Syrian and Iraqi Kurdistan.

Conflicting reports suggest the People’s Protection Units (YPG), the armed wing of the PYD, are still occupying the Iraqi side of the border crossing, with peshmerga fighters asking them to leave. Hashim Sitey, the local peshmerga commander in Rabia, told KDP-affiliated Rudaw on June 16 that they tried to ask YPG forces to surrender the crossing, but that they have so far refused.