Talks between the Syrian government and the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces have stalled, a Syrian government official said Friday, raising concerns that the organization will not be integrated into the Syrian military by the end-of-the-year deadline.
An unnamed senior Syrian Foreign Ministry official told the state-owned SANA News Agency that talks between the SDF and Damascus, which have gone on for weeks, have produced no “concrete results.”
The official added that the SDF’s negotiators have made demands that are out of step with “conditions on the ground,” and the organization’s participation seems to be aimed at “media messaging and easing political pressure rather than moving toward implementation.”
Damascus and SDF leadership met in March and signed an agreement that would see the SDF fully integrated into the Syrian Armed Forces by the end of 2025. However, repeated clashes between SDF and Syrian troops in the northeast and Aleppo have hurt the chances of total integration.
Most recently, conflict erupted between the two forces in Aleppo, Syria, on Dec. 22 during a visit from Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan.
The SDF was one of the main fighting forces opposing the now toppled government of former President Bashar Assad during the Syrian civil war and received significant support from the U.S. The organization is seen as the armed branch of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which is viewed as a terrorist organization by the U.S. and Turkey.
According to reports, the SDF prefers an integration framework that would allow for many of its existing battalions to be absorbed into the Syrian army while still maintaining some degree of autonomy. Additionally, the SDF has not signaled any willingness to integrate its centralized administration in the northeast with Damascus.
Still, the new Syrian government’s broad diplomatic support from Western nations, including the U.S., could signal further progress for negotiations. U.S. special envoy to Syria Tom Barrack, who’s also the U.S. ambassador to Turkey, has been adamant that the SDF should fully integrate into the Syrian Armed Forces and that the U.S. would not support an SDF-led autonomous region in Syria’s northeast.
