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Why the Syrian Kurds were excluded from the constitutional committee?
Zara Saleh
UN General Secretary- Antonio Guterres- declared, on Monday 23rd of September, that the agreement finally has been reached between the Syrian government and the Syrian opposition about the formation a “ Constitutional Committee”, which will take responsibility of drafting a new Syrian constitution.
Meanwhile, the French president Macron ,during the “ Small Group” meeting, was suggesting to discuss the important of general election in Syria, following the UN's decision 2254. Which will be the next direction step of finding a political solution.
The United Nations special envoy of Syria, Geir Pedersen, announced that the Constitutional Committee, scheduled the first committee’s meeting in October 30 in Geneva. But, if we look deeply to this deal, we can understand the role of the main real players who were behind assigning the constitutional committee members. Relating to that, in a joint press conference between presidents of Russia, Iran and Turkey, they declared that an agreement has been reached to form the Syrian Constitutional Committee . Which will serve their political agendas first.
The agreement supposed to be comprehensive and guarantee the participation of all Syrian components and to be in compliance of the UN resolution 2254. Which clearly indicates that none of the Syrian components will be excepted or excluded from the Constitutional Committee.
However, this constitutional committee can't represent all Syrian people for several reasons. First of all, it is in fact an agreement between Putin, Rouhani and Erdogan who represent the three occupied countries of Syrian territories. Secondly, the Kurds and other cultural and religious groups has been excluded by Iran and Turkey. Both regimes are against any kurdish presence in the new Syrian constitution. Which is a Russian favour too. Russia considers as the spokesman of the Assad's regime.
In the last meeting of the Security Council, the special envoy for Syria G. Pedersen again confirms that the all Syrian components are represented in the constitutional committee including the Kurds. In fact, this speech doesn't reflect the reality of the matter.
Despite there is a few kurdish names among the constitutional committee, but they are not represent the Syrian Kurds as a nation nor the Kurds independent and real presence in the Constitutional Committee . Those kurds are part of the Syrian Coalition backed by Turkey such as Kurdish National Council and other two members who are baked the Syrian government.
In addition, the twelve principles of Geneva’s deal about the future of Syria, which might be the basis of the next new Syrian constitution, doesn't mention anything regarding to the kurdish issue in Syria.
Therefore, there's no doubt that this constitutional committee doesn't reflect the real representation of the Syrians people.
Many Syrian are not satisfied with the represented constitutional committee members, because they present the interests of Turkey, Iran and Russia but not the Syrian. Thus, for most of the Syrian people this committee is nothing related to them.
Furthermore, this step of formation of the constitutional committee, will be new an attempt, under the UN’s umbrella, for rehabilitation of the Assad's regime and its previous 2012 constitution.
In comparing with the regional countries such as Turkey and Iran, consequently, the role of the international community regarding the Syrian constitutional issue has been declined. The regional countries are against the kurdish rights in Syria, and also the Syrian opposition and regime’s agreement to oppose the kurdish demands for federal state means that the future of Syria is going towards central dictatorship state again.
