Agreement will see government takeover of SDF-controlled areas, and SDF integration into the Syrian military.
The Syrian government has announced a ceasefire has been agreed with the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) that will involve the withdrawal of the latter’s forces from areas west of the Euphrates River, according to Syrian state media.
Sunday’s deal will also see SDF forces integrate into the Syrian military.
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The agreement comes after days of fighting between the Syrian government and the SDF in northeastern Syria. The army and the SDF had been clashing over strategic posts and oilfields along the Euphrates River.
Speaking in Damascus, Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa said that the agreement will see Syrian state institutions move into three eastern and northern governorates – al-Hasakah, Deir Az Zor, and Raqqa – previously controlled by the SDF.
“We advise our Arab tribes to remain calm and allow for the implementation of the agreement’s terms,” al-Sharaa said.
The agreement stipulates that the SDF administration in charge of ISIL (ISIS) detainees and camps, and the forces guarding the facilities, will be integrated into the country’s state structure, now giving the government full legal and security responsibility.
Additionally, the SDF will propose a list of leaders to fill senior military, security, and civilian posts within the central government, ensuring national partnership.
Al-Sharaa made the announcement after he met United States Special Envoy to Syria Tom Barrack in Damascus. SDF chief Mazloum Abdi was supposed to be at the meeting, but al-Sharaa said that weather conditions meant that his trip would be postponed until Monday.
But Barrack welcomed the ceasefire and wrote in a post on X that it was a “pivotal inflection point, where former adversaries embrace partnership over division”.
“President al-Sharaa has affirmed that the Kurds are an integral part of Syria, and the United States looks forward to the seamless integration of our historic partner in the fight against ISIS with the Global Coalition’s newest member, as we press forward in the enduring battle against terrorism,” he added.
‘Victory’
media’s Ayman Oghanna, reporting from the Syrian capital, said the ceasefire can be seen as a “victory for Damascus and its ally Turkiye”.
“Turkiye sees the SDF as the Syrian branch of the PKK, an organisation that Turkiye has been at war with since 1984, and now, as part of the ceasefire agreement, it says that the SDF will expel PKK elements from outside of Syria’s borders,” he said.
“Now cities like Raqqa and Hasakah and Deir Az Zor will be under full government control with civil institutions under Damascus rule, which is really what Damascus was hoping for, and it’s played out very well for them indeed,” Oghanna added.
Syrian state media says that the agreement will see the military handover of the SDF-controlled governorates and the takeover of civilian institutions.
The Syrian government will also take over “all border crossings and oil and gas fields”.
A previous agreement in March that included the integration of SDF forces into the Syrian military was not implemented, and fighting has periodically broken out between the two sides in recent months, increasing in ferocity this month.
But on Saturday, the Syrian army continued its advance into towns in the SDF-held territory.
According to state media, the army had taken the northern city of Tabqa and its adjacent dam, as well as the major Freedom dam, formerly known as the Baath, west of Raqqa.
Moreover, the army seized the Omar oilfield, the country’s largest, and the Conoco gas field in Deir Az Zor, in a major blow to the SDF. Last week, al-Sharaa said it was unacceptable for the SDF to control a quarter of the country and hold its main oil and other commodity resources.
According to Gamal Mansour, a lecturer in political science at the University of Toronto, the SDF had become isolated politically, explaining their rapid retreat.
“Sometimes you have arms, but your political situation, the lack of backing, the strategic and regional background in which you’re operating … therein lies the problem that SDF has,” he told media.
“Iraqi Kurdistan read the regional image and the strategic posture of the SDF in a way that had them go to the SDF and tell them ‘you need to … [cooperate] with the Americans so that you can have a peaceful relationship with the Syrian government’”, he said, adding that the US has also told the SDF as much.
Mansour explained that the success of the Syrian government’s rapid advance was also driven largely by Arab tribes in SDF-controlled areas, whose loyalty to the SDF was already fragile amid discontent with their rule, Kurdish nationalist dominance and a lack of economic investment.
The ceasefire agreement also outlined that the SDF had committed to the removal of all non-Syrian Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) leaders and members from the territory to ensure sovereignty and regional stability.
