Yasser Al-Farhan
The huge amount of information contained in the reports of international and local human rights organizations provides those searching for the truth – impartially and objectively – with sufficient knowledge of the nature of the Syrian Democratic Forces, its policies and its structure linked – with its executive and political bodies – to the Democratic Union Party (PYD) and its military wing (YPG), and with what… It was issued by major foreign and Arab newspapers, videos on public satellite channels and YouTube clips, and through direct communication with various parties and listening to the testimonies of witnesses and activists; We conclude four main characteristics that characterize the systematic behavior of PYD, which we quickly summarize as follows:
First: PYD – YPG / SDF – MSD is actually affiliated with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party PKK, and is mainly subject to the orders of its leaders, and from the evidence to prove this fact we present the following:
1 – Verifying data on those killed in battle; It was revealed in a report by Gard Firs (a reserve officer in the US Army) and Andrew Salve (George Washington University) published in a special issue in the NATO Defense Against Terrorist Attacks Center, entitled (The Dead Don’t Lie), which concludes that the PKK has no real branches, but rather three. Fronts and three different names for those fronts. The three fronts have the same leaders, ideologies, and even the same terrorist history.
2 – The actual military reality confirms the complete actual control of non-Syrian cadres (Turkish or Iranian) over the declared leadership in Syria of the SDF and MSD, which are used formally to appear in the forefront.
3 – The hierarchical organizational structure proves the subordination of all these formations to a single leadership that issues orders to everyone from Qandil and punishes anyone who violates it.
4 – Changing the educational curricula in the Autonomous Administration areas controlled by these organizations, by introducing (the culture and thought of Leader Abdullah Ocalan)
5 – Raising pictures of Abdullah Ocalan in the squares of the cities they control and in their headquarters;
Second: PYD – SDF – MSD, multiple names for one organization, practicing behaviors and implementing measures that pave the way for the division of Syria and impose a de facto separation from it, including but not limited to:
1. The announcement on 10/26/2011 of the People’s Assembly of Western Kurdistan as an elected parliament – nominally – in the areas of Al-Hasakah Governorate, and of an independent constitution.
2. Imposing the teaching of the Kurdish language in all government schools in the areas under its control, whether the students are Arabs, Kurds, Syriacs, Assyrians, Turkmen, Armenians, or Circassians.
3. Declaring self-administration unilaterally and imposing it by force of arms while personally decorating some of its other components.
4. Obligating Syrian citizens to obtain visas to enter any of the areas under its control, and requiring the presence of a sponsor and approval from the party.
5. Imposing compulsory conscription into its ranks on the sons and daughters of the region, kidnapping children from their families and schools and hiding them in the Qandil Mountains to brainwash them, nourish them with violent and hateful tendencies, and recruit them;
6. Demographics were changed by destroying entire Arab villages and by forcibly displacing Arabs, Turkmen, and Christians by committing crimes of genocide amounting to ethnic cleansing.
Third: PYD is a party that cooperates with the regime and is hostile to the revolution:
1. He practiced the policy of shabbih and suppression of peaceful Kurdish and Arab demonstrators at the beginning of the revolution, where he arrested their activists and opened fire – along with the military security patrol – on peaceful demonstrations, initially killing three Arab demonstrators – including a child – in the demonstration in the Al-Nasra neighborhood in Hasakah in late 2012, and in a demonstration His column 7 is from the Kurds and many other things.
2. The regime handed over many areas to the PYD without a fight for fear that they would fall into the hands of the opposition, such as Rumailan, Al-Malikiyah, Ma’bada, Al-Jawadiyah, Al-Qahtaniyah, and Amudah, so that it could concentrate its forces in other areas.
3. The PYD stood militarily side by side with the regime forces facing the Free Army brigades. This was in the first months of the revolution and before the Al-Nusra Front or ISIS appeared in Syria.
4. The PYD receives financial support, weapons, and training mainly from the regime, and coordinates its operations with the so-called “Hajjaj” Iranian militias.
5. PYD is the Syrian face of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which was founded, supported and trained by Hafez al-Assad, and sponsored by the security services.
Fourth: PYD is involved in war crimes and crimes against humanity, including (mass murder, arbitrary arrest, bulldozing homes, burning crops, confiscating property, and forcing the people of the region into forced displacement)
1. Amnesty International – Amnesty report (We had nowhere else to go) Forced displacement and house demolitions in northern Syria, October 2015;
2. Report of the Syrian Network for Human Rights – October 27, 2015, entitled No Alternative to Return… Violations by Kurdish Self-Administration Forces in Al-Hasakah Governorate. The widespread violations cause the forced displacement of tens of thousands of residents of the governorate;
3. Evaluation of the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies, October 2015, entitled The ins and outs of the Kurdish issue in light of attempts to change the demographic composition of the Syrian Jazira region;
4. Human Rights Watch report on June 19, 2014 entitled (Under Kurdish rule. violations in areas controlled by the Kurdish Democratic Union Party, arbitrary arrests and the use of children as soldiers in battle)
5. Report of the Center for Republic Studies;
6. Reports of the Assyrian Network for Human Rights in Syria;
7. Reports of the Kurdish human rights organization KurdWatch;
9. A statement on behalf of the United States of America issued by the Director of the Office of Press Relations, Femtrell Patrick.
10. British newspaper The Times’ report on the ethnic cleansing campaigns carried out by Kurdish forces against Syrian Arabs in the areas under their control, June 1, 2015.
11. Announcement of the Swiss Humanity Appeal Organization, July 5, 2014, in which BYD did not implement its pledges;
12. German Focus magazine article, June 1, 2015
13. Statement by US State Department spokesman Jeff Rathke dated June 12, 2015.
With a lot of evidence documented by witness testimonies and video clips, we can provide further clarification if you wish.
1. The PYD – YPG / SDF -MSD militias adopt systematic racist policies, including imposing the Kurdish language on the non-Kurdish population in schools and government centres, and adopt a change in the education curricula internationally recognized by UNESCO, to curricula that incite hatred and rob future generations of their identity. Unifying patriotism threatens the unity of Syria and the values of its people, which prompted many parents – Arabs, Syriacs, Turkmen and Kurds – to prefer leaving the country to countries of asylum in order to educate their children, while most of those who cannot leave preferred not to send their children to schools, because of these curricula. This carries grave risks for future generations in the region. We note, however, that most Syrian Kurdish families do not accept these policies, and this is what drives them to leave the country and seek refuge with their children in other countries.
2. This behavior is accompanied by the Autonomous Administration’s seizure of lands and property, and with an attempt to legitimize this by issuing the so-called Law 7/2020 for the management and protection of absentees’ funds, which allows the seizure of real estate and movables, to be used and invested in circumstances of the deliberate absence of their owners, and with de facto authorities imposing guardianship. Forced on the holders of housing and property rights, by appointing custodians of them without their consent. By analyzing the text issued, its effects become clear in restricting or depriving the absent person of his right to the rents of his property, and to receive it, which as a result narrows the motives and opportunities for the return of refugees, so the authority of the agency is similar to the authority of its client. In his unjust legislation in this regard, such as Law 10 and Decree 66; Despite the freeze on what they called Law 7, its issuers and the continued management of absentee funds expose the plans of these militias to repeat the experience of seizing Arab funds in Palestine by the Israeli occupation authorities.
3. These de facto authorities seize the region’s wealth, resources, and oil wells. They use the money to purchase real estate for the benefit of their arms affiliated with the Qandil Mountains, to change the economic and social balances in Syria, and to do so, they exploit the difficult living conditions that the people are experiencing. This coincides with neglecting to support the agricultural sector, which lives The people in areas under the control of the Autonomous Administration, for consecutive years, prevented them from selling their livelihood in other areas, at a better price than the low price imposed on them in this area, as if it were a deliberate policy to impoverish people in order to humiliate them, recruit them, or displace them;
4. The hostile actions against the people in the countryside of Deir ez-Zor and Raqqa – as a result of their legitimate protest against human rights violations against them, and because of their dissatisfaction with the assassination of some of their symbols, in areas controlled by the Syrian Democratic Forces, expose the common behavior between the Assad regime and the Autonomous Administration, in dealing with the people’s demands for freedom. And dignity, and living in a democratic civil state. Precedents and evidence confirm that both parties share criminal responsibility for these assassinations, and those that preceded them, starting in 2011, when the Assad regime repeatedly conducted joint patrols between its intelligence and the Asayish, to suppress peaceful demonstrators, shoot them, and kill many. And activists in the neighborhoods of Tal Hajar in Hasakah, Amuda, Qamishli, and others; This expanded the circle of popular tension in the governorates of Hasakah, Deir ez-Zor, and Raqqa, and caused further rejection of these militias.
5. The policies of tyranny and oppression adopted by the PYD reveal the falsity of its claim to respect democracy, and its repeated practices of violating the freedom and rights of expression of Kurdish activists and politicians in the Kurdish National Council, and of media professionals and Arab youth who demand human rights in their regions, confirming that the behavior of the PKK/terrorist organization is rooted in it;
6. These systematic policies and grave violations committed against the population led to the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Arab villagers after the destruction of their villages in Tal Brak, Jabal Abdul Aziz, Al-Hasakah, Tal Tamr, and Tal Hamis, according to what was confirmed by Amnesty International and a number of independent organizations in their announced reports;
7. Arbitrary arrest, enforced disappearance, torture and liquidation are a continuing behavior among the PYD militia, affecting activists and peaceful opponents, more than it affects ISIS terrorists. Based on our practical experiences, the efforts of international organizations have failed to enter their secret prisons, just as they have failed to release their prisoners of conscience.
8. Reports on cases of forced recruitment of children by the PYD – YPG / PKK, depriving them of their families and education, brainwashing them, and feeding them violent, hateful ideas. Continuous behavior exposes the deep-rooted nature of these militias, and confirms their lies to the international community, and the falsity of their claims in their commitment. With its pledges to the international community in this context;
9. On the other hand, evidence confirms the involvement of the PYD – YPG / PKK militias in hostile terrorist operations, in which booby traps and explosives are used in a professional, continuous and systematic manner, targeting civilians in opposition areas, to disrupt efforts to build security, peace and stability in the region, and to divert attention from joint efforts. In applying the standards of the rule of law and promoting human rights;
10. The continuation of its hidden and ongoing strategic alliance with Iran and the Assad regime, which is organically linked to its intelligence services;
11. The failure of all attempts to disengage from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, and the impossibility of achieving this effectively, despite the pressure and mediation played by the United States of America and France during its sponsorship of the negotiations between the Kurdish National Council and the de facto authority;
12. We point out that the military victories over terrorism were achieved through American air, financial, and logistical support, and not thanks to these militias that exploited it to plunder money and smuggle it out of the country.
13. We point out the exploitation and use of weapons and funds provided by the international coalition for the purposes of fighting terrorism to attack civilians and their rights, and because of the legal responsibilities this entails on all parties supporting these militias;
14. It is necessary to examine the reasons for the failure of the PYD – YPG / PKK to completely eliminate terrorism and its sleeper cells, and to prevent the return of ISIS, given that combating terrorism at the medium and long-term level requires relying on partners on the ground who are people of the region and enjoy the acceptance and cooperation of its people.
