By Martín Romero
Traduced by Pablo Mestrovic
Changes on the ground
It is not anything new that Geneva negotiations, intended to solve the
Syrian crisis, have not bore fruits. But since their last round, there have
been many changes on the ground and regarding the negotiations between the
parties.
Regarding the military situation, the advance of Baath’s regime forces
and its allies, Russia and Iran, is remarkable. It must be remembered that
these forces are not only the Syrian Arab Army and Baath affiliated local
militias, but also Iraqi Shia militias and the Lebanese Hezbollah, together
with important quantities of Russian and Iranian troops.
These advances have been achieved mostly against the groups affiliated
with Syrian National Coalition, which are linked to Turkey and Gulf monarchies
and against the “former” Al Nusra Front (now called Fatih al Sham Front, after
its split from Al Qaeda), a tactical – and in some cases even ideological- ally
of several of these groups.
Regime’s offensive against eastern Aleppo, under the control of said
militias has closed the encirclement, has cut the only supply route, laying the
siege to the eastern neighborhoods of the city. Their residents suffer the
bombings of Syrian Air Force, Russian aircraft, Syrian army artillery and the
mortar and rockets fire of both
pro-Assad and opposition militias.
The fighting have increased after the counter attack of the opposition,
intended to break the siege, unleashing a fire storm over the city coming from
all directions. The population is not only suffering the consecuences of
military actions and the random shots. There is also scarcity of basic
supplies, lack of basic services, food y emergency aid, so Aleppo is going
through a terrible humanitarian crisis.
Regime’s operations against the self-proclaimed Islamic State have had
other outcomes. The more important of them has been the frustrated offensive
against Raqqah. Its start was an answer to the announcement of an operation by
Syrian Democratic Forces to liberate Caliphate’s capital, which later was
suspended in order to concentrate all the efforts on the liberation of Manbij.
Islamic State gangs inflicted an astonishing defeat to the regime and its
allies in the outskirts of al-Tabqah, through a counter attack, causing many
casualties and a chaotic retreat.
On the other hand, Syrian Democratic Forces have liberated huge areas
and towns in the west bank of the Euphrates, in which seemed an advance to link
the canton of Efrin with the other ones. However, that advance was halted, and
the efforts were focused on the siege of Manbij and its slow liberation of
terrorist gang which hid inside it, using trapped civilians as human shields y
set explosive devices everywhere.
Negotiations take place not only in Switzerland
A meaningful fact of the last weeks was the failed coup attempt by a
part of Turkish armed forces – with which we have dealt broadly in several
notes in kurdistandesdelsur.blogspot.com.ar – caused substantive changes in the
relationship between the countries involved in the Syrian conflict.
Secret conversations had already taken place in Algeria between the
government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the one of Bashar Al Assad, which were
sponsored by the Iranian government. And there are constant interviews between
foreign affairs ministers of Russia and the United States, Sergei Lavrov and
John Kerry, which ¿by chance? were meeting the day of Turkish military coup attempt.
Despite the counter-coup and the repression which was unleashed by
Turkish government, which got stronger only in the short term, the limits and
weaknesses of Erdogan regarding his ambitions, start to come to light and for
that reason he is forced to make pacts with his rivals. this, to the pressure
of main world powers and the deep
economic, social and political crisis which Turkey is going through, is the
reason for the rapprochement of Erdogan
with Russia, Syria and Iran.
Another common factor between these two states and Turkey is the Kurdish
question, which worries both of three, because their authoritarian regimes see
the Kurds as a threat to their internal policies, based as they are on
political repression and supression of ethnic minorities.
Now, ¿what concerns the United States and Russia regarding the Kurdish
issue? There are clues, coming from statements from senior officers of both
states, and actions, both diplomatic and military following them, of Kurdish
autonomy breaking up the new political map designed for the future by the main
powers and their plans for the region.
Kurdish autonomy, federalism and plebiscite
Following two different paths, both the administrations of Kurdistan
Regional Governemt (of Iraq) and Rojava have promoted autonomy processes, not
only against the will of the governments of the states occupying these regions
of Kurdistan (Iraq and Syria), but also against the will of Iran’s theocratic
regime, which also occupies part of Kurdistan and is allied with both.
In Rojava and Northern Syria, a Federal Administration has been
declared, promoted by representative organs of all communities living in the
region. A Constituent Charter has been redacted, a capital has been declared
and Syrian Democratic Forces have been made the official self-defence forces.
In Bashur (Iraqi Kurdistan) the Kurdistan Regional Government, represented
by president Massoud Barzani, has promoted a plebiscite to choose on the
independence from Iraqi state.
That is the way as the possibility of self-determination of Kurds starts
to take a more solid form, but in two different ways, because the second one is
linked to clans’ interests and their businesses with neighbouring countries,
and the first one to multiethnic democracy and social revolution which is being
carried out in Rojava.
The negotiating parties and Geneva
Let’s sum to all this that Iran, after the 5 +1 Pact, has become the real
protagonist in the Middle East, despite the ambitions of Erdogan and the
successes of Turkey, taking the role of regional interlocutor and ally both of
the United States and Russia. This happens as a result of the weakness of the
Americans in imposing their plans in international relations, both political
and commercial.
That is the reason why Russia and the United States accelerate or stop
the Geneva negotiations according to what happens on the ground. The reason for
the disagreement in the last round of discussions has been the inclusion (or
not) of a representation in them of the Federal Administration of Rojava and
Northern Syria. Up to now, both the Syrian regime and the opposition have been
uncompromising on the participation of a delegation of that origin in the
conversations.
It is in the same sense of definitions we make in “Kurdistan from the
South”, that the issue is dealt with in an article published in Hawar News (http://en.hawarnews.com/worries-over-aleppo-and-calls-for-helping-refugees/) In that article, the co-president of the Democratic Assembly of
Rojava and Northern Syria, Ilham Ahmed, talked about what happens in the
negotiations’ arena, the secret pacts, and about some parties not aiding the
refugees. She also talked about the humanitarian catastrophes produced by the
war not being taken seriously, while the powers and the governments show the
bargaining cards.
Not only them, but all the voices taking part to some extent in the
negotiations, have raised against the federalist statement, differing in some
points and coinciding in others. The unity of Syria was until now the main
argument, alleging that the will of the peoples of Rojava and Northern Syria is
“unilateral” and threatens the unity of Syria. That is the way they hide that
there is a common interest uniting the Baathist regime, Syrian opposition
coalition, the governments of Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and also Russia and the
United States.
However, Lavrov has been the one who tried to convince the other parties
of the necessity of the presence of a Rojava delegation in the conversations,
and this has not been totally, but also hase found support in some of the
parties, including the special envoy of the UN, Staffan de Mistura, and some
other US officers.
Knowing the general purposes of all the actors, everything pointed to
the next negotiations in Geneva having also the purpose of crushing the
revolution in Rojava and Northern Syria, limiting its horizons to the framework
of imperialist plans and regional authoritarian regimes y eroding the will of
freedom and self-determination of Kurdish people and other minorities which see
Rojava as an example to follow. Will the next session in Geneva a new version
of Laussanne treaty, as we already warned in previous articles (read http://debateskurdos.blogspot.com.ar/2016/05/ginebra-es-una-trampa-imperialista-para.html).
