ByNews Desk- The Cradle
Abu Dhabi has categorically denied that any meeting with the SDF chief took place
The report claims that the leader of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) Mazloum Abdi traveled to the UAE recently “in order to seek Abu Dhabi’s help to press the Syrian Kurds’ case with the Assad regime,” citing four anonymous officials well-informed on the matter.
This comes “amid fading [Kurdish] confidence in the United States, and the Arab outreach to Damascus,” Al-Monitor said.
Abdi’s visit reportedly took place shortly before he was targeted in a Turkish drone strike in Iraq last month.
One of the sources claimed that during the visit, Abdi met with UAE National Security Adviser Tahnoun bin Zayed Al-Nahyan.
However, Abu Dhabi denied that any such meeting had taken place.
“It is one hundred percent true,” one of Al-Monitor’s sources said.
Badran Jia Kurd, the head of the AANES foreign relations office, told Al-Monitor that “[the UAE] said they are ready to help, but so far, we do not have a program (roadmap) for this … We want them to play a role in the talks with Damascus.”
The Kurdish official declined to comment on Abdi’s alleged trip to the UAE.
One of the sources said, however, that Bafel Talabani – leader of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) – had traveled with Abdi to the UAE.
“The Turkish drone is widely believed to have deliberately missed the target, and Kobane made it home. The goal was to telegraph Ankara’s fury over the shuttling of Kobane by the PUK leader to the UAE,” the report cites one of the officials as saying.
Recently, Washington has been losing the favor of its Kurdish ally in Syria.
While Türkiye is itself in the early stages of talks with Damascus, Ankara’s anti-Kurdish operations and occupation in Syria have been ongoing, and the Kurds have on many occasions expressed concern that Washington may not be willing to protect them from the Turkish military.
Since the start of the year, SDF and AANES officials have held a number of somewhat positive meetings with the Damascus government.
However, new reports claim that negotiations between Syria and the Kurds recently ceased abruptly due to the government’s refusal to grant them autonomy. According to reports, Damascus has also threatened an offensive to recapture the territory of the AANES, where the US army collaborates with the SDF to illegally occupy the country’s oilfields.
This follows a recent Kurdish proposal put forth by the AANES, which calls for a fair distribution of the country’s resources among all regions of Syria.
While negotiations have reportedly turned sour, the Kurds have emphasized their willingness to continue down the path of “Syrian-Syrian dialogue” in order to reach a solution to the crisis in the country.
In January this year, Kurdish sources close to the SDF told Al-Akhbar newspaper that “the most appropriate solution for the region lies with Damascus.”
The SDF chief has also recently said that Damascus would protect Syria’s north in the event of a Turkish ground offensive.
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