Syria Kurds, regime officials to press talks after deadly clashes in Qamishlo

Syrian regime officials and Kurdish representatives were to meet Saturday for a second day of talks on ending deadly clashes in the northeastern Kurdish city of Qamishlo in Syrian Kurdistan, a senior security source said.

A truce agreed on Friday held through the night, an AFP correspondent reported, and no gunfire was heard in the mainly Kurdish city where control is split between Kurdish militia and the Syrian army and its allies.

The army and the Kurds have coordinated on security in Hasaka province against Islamic State group jihadists, but tensions have built up between the sometimes rival authorities.

The fighting in Qamishlo began on Wednesday with a scuffle at a checkpoint and was a rare outbreak of violence between the two sides.

According to the Kurdish security forces, the three days of fighting have left 17 civilians, 10 Kurdish fighters and 31 troops and allied militiamen dead.

Nearly 50 Assad regime forces surrender to Syrian Kurds in Qamishlo.

Government officials and Kurdish representatives met at Qamishlo’s army-controlled airport on Friday and agreed to observe a truce until a lasting settlement to the dispute is reached.

“There will be a new meeting today (Saturday) at Qamishlo airport,” a senior security source in Damascus told AFP.

“They will discuss several points, including an exchange of fighters held by each side and the Kurds handing back control of the neighbourhoods they took from the regime,” the source said.

Early Saturday, there were fewer fighters from either side on the streets. Even checkpoints that had been erected during the fighting had been taken down overnight.

AFP footage showed some few residents venturing out from their homes.

Alan Baku, a Kurdish civilian, said residents had mostly remained indoors, however.

“They can’t leave,” the 30-year-old said. “We’re in an area that was rocked by clashes yesterday.”

“A few people are walking around because of the truce.”

Among them was Ali Saadoun, an Arabic language professor returning home from the local market.

“The situation is calm and both sides are holding their positions because of the truce,” the 37-year-old said.
“We hope that it’ll continue and that the clashes will stop. We don’t want our city to be destroyed.”

The army and its militia ally, the National Defence Forces, control Qamishlo airport and parts of the city, as well as parts of the provincial capital Hasaka to the south.

Nearly all of the rest of the province is controlled by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), who have declared an autonomous region across Syrian Kurdistan, the mainly Kurdish northern areas they control.

On March 17, 2016 Syria’s Kurds declared a federal region in Syrian Kurdistan. The Syrian government responded by saying that the Kurds’ unilateral decision had no legal power.

Nearly 3 million Kurds live in Syrian Kurdistan.

The powerful Kurdish YPG forces, which the U.S. and Russia consider an ally in the fight against Islamic State, are regarded as the most effective group fighting IS in Syria, as the Kurdish militia has seized swathes of Syria from Islamic State.