Kurds Pulling Out of North Syria as Ceasefire Largely Holds

The north Syria ceasefire brokered between the US and Turkey came into effect on Friday, and despite claims of violations, and a few Turkish airstrikes, fighting is down substantially, and the Kurds are moving out of the “safe zone.”

By any measure that means the ceasefire, if not working perfectly, is working relatively well, considering how much skepticism there was. That said, it’s only a five day deal, and there are already signs it is under pressure.

Turkey’s airstrikes are pressure, to be sure, but not shocking given the Erdogan government’s position on Kurds. The big problem, however, is that Turkey and the Kurds can’t seem to agree what the truce deal actually says.

The Kurds are arguing that the ceasefire is limited to a 120 km stretch of the safe zone from Tal Abyad to Ras al-Ayn, the area Turkey was directly attacking at the time. Turkey says it covers the entire 444 km stretch of border the Kurds controlled before the Turkish invasion began.

The deal is a bit vague on that, something Syrian officials expressed concern about. This is particularly important as the Kurdish forces already ceded the western-most part of this territory, including Kobane and Manbij, to the Assad government to defend.

Since neither the US or Turkey has anything to say about what the Syrian government does, it’s impractical to think that a bilateral deal would oblige Syria to surrender that territory. The Kurds have said they’ll respect the deal, but only their understanding of it.

The US likely doesn’t care what happens in Syria-controlled Syria, particularly if Turkey chooses to invade them and prop up rebels in that area. It is with this view that the US is making no effort to clarify what they thought the deal actually meant.