Former US presidential envoy to Syria Brett McGurk criticized the deployment of the Bradleys, calling it a “sign of deterioration.”
“I used to help coordinate this mission. We never needed Bradleys to secure our personnel. Trump’s impetuous decision to abandon our posts has placed our people at heightened risk with no clear aim,” McGurk said on Friday.
The Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (NES) announced the deal with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad‘s government in a Sunday evening statement.
“This deployment occurred through coordination and agreement with the Self-Administration Authority for Northern and Eastern Syria and the Syrian Democratic Forces,” the statement said.
Syria‘s Kurds have announced a groundbreaking deal with Damascus on a Syrian troop deployment near the border with Turkey, as Ankara presses a deadly cross-border offensive that has sparked an international outcry.
The announcement on Sunday came as the United States ordered the withdrawal of almost its entire ground force in Syria.
Al-Makdad rief die Kurden zudem auf, an die Seite der Regierung in Damaskus zurückzukommen und sich nicht „selbst in die Hölle zu stürzen“, nachdem die Kurden von den USA im Stich gelassen worden seien.
Der Kommandant der von Kurden dominierten Syrischen Demokratischen Kräfte (SDF), Maslum Abdi, teilte mit, dass eine Partnerschaft mit Syriens Präsident Baschar al-Assad eine mögliche Option sei.
The US should never have been there in the first place (though reading Hillary Clinton‘s late-night response to Trump it is clearer than ever that the world dodged more than a bullet when she failed to win the presidency).
The Kurdish people should have never placed their fate in the hands of a far off and thoroughly unreliable US “ally” which has picked them up only to put them back on the shelf so many times before. Syrian Kurds belong to Syria and it is with their Syrian neighbours and government that the SDF should have been in alliance.
“At that time we may hold talks with Damascus or the Russian side to fill the void or block the Turkish attack, so this may develop and there could be meetings and contacts in case of a vacuum,” he added.
A senior Syrian government official, in return, said Damascus is ready to welcome Syria‘s Kurds back into the fold after Washington left them to face Turkish military threats alone.
„In order for the AANES to continue to safeguard the people‘s rights and play a role in all Syria, an agreement with Damascus is necessary. This is why we have repeatedly tried, either directly or through Russia, to hold dialogue with Damascus and reach a political agreement to end the Syrian crisis and confront the agendas seeking the division of the Syrian territory“, Badran Jiakurd, an adviser to the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria, said.