The jailed co-chair of Turkey’s pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), Selahattin Demirtaş, said that the U.S. and Russian troops are deployed in northern Syria because Turkey preferred forming an alliance with al-Nusra to the Kurdish entities.
The U.S., which once supported jihadist militants trying to overthrow the Syrian government and later focused on Kurdish militants, said its current presence was necessary as long as the threat of a resurgent Islamic State and other jihadist groups remained.
The open-ended U.S. commitment in Syria will likely rile Russia, which since late 2015 has conducted a separate military campaign. Unlike Russia, the United States is not in Syria at the request or approval of the Syrian government.
The main Syrian Kurdish political party, the PYD, welcomed a longer-term role for U.S. forces in Syria, saying the Americans should continue to play a role until a political solution to the Syrian crisis.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad recently said that all the U.S.-backed Kurdish armed militants are “traitors” to the Syrian nation, regarding the Kurdish militant coalition in Syria as an illegitimate force receiving vital substantial air and arms support from Washington.
POSSIBLE TALKS WITH ERDOĞAN'S GOVERNMENT
In answer to a question on President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s foreign policy and his shifting definition of "friend-enemy country", Demirtaş said, "If Turkey could form a strategic alliance with Rojava [the Kurdish autonomous region in northern Syria], the peace talks on Syria would be held in Ankara, not in Geneva, Astana or Sochi."
Saying that his HDP party endeavoured for such an alliance all the time, Demirtaş continued, “Nevertheless, we need to struggle to build new bridges and open new doors,” giving a signal for new possible talks between the AKP government and his HDP party.
Selahattin Demirtaş has been under arrest since November 4, 2016, facing hundreds of years in prison over alleged links to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) as well as other charges.
