Kurdish leader calls for Kurdish rights to be enshrined in Syria’s constitution — The National

Syrian Kurdish leader Ilham Ahmed called at a forum in Erbil, Iraq, for the rights of the Kurdish community to be enshrined in Syria’s constitution. She warned that a move toward a more centralized model of government could heighten tensions, The National reports.

Integration of Kurdish forces

Ahmed, who previously served as a senior official in the Kurdish autonomous administration in northeastern Syria, is now a member of the foreign relations committee of the Syrian parliament. According to her, the process of integrating the Syrian Democratic Forces into Syria’s armed forces has made significant progress but is still ongoing.

She said that the unification of the forces helped restore connections between cities, open border crossings and create conditions for greater stability after the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime. At the same time, Ahmed noted that the role of women in state institutions and decision-making is diminishing despite the integration process.

Kurdish leader Mazloum Abdi said in August in Qamishli that the integration of the Kurdish administration into Syria’s state institutions had been completed. This process is based on an agreement between Damascus and the Syrian Democratic Forces concluded in January through mediation by Washington and Paris and with Ankara’s support.

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Language and decentralization

In January, President Ahmad al-Sharaa issued a decree providing for the recognition of Nowruz as a national holiday and Kurdish as a national language that may be taught in public and private schools in Kurdish-populated areas. Syrian citizenship was also granted to Kurds who had previously lacked citizenship.

Ahmed called the recognition of Kurdish identity and language a historic achievement, but stressed that practical mechanisms for implementing the decree, particularly in the field of Kurdish-language education, have not yet been created. In Hasakah, Qamishli and Kobani, students and teachers are holding demonstrations against restrictions on Kurdish-language instruction introduced by the new authorities in Damascus.

In Ahmed’s view, decentralization in Syria is mistakenly perceived as a threat to the country’s territorial unity. She said that the use and study of several languages do not divide the state but strengthen Syrian culture.