Some 400 Kurdish leaders and representatives from across Syria and the region met in Qamishli in northeast Syria on 26 April 2025 to put forward a common political vision for Syrian Kurds. While the conference brought together various Kurdish groups, it is no secret that the main driver of the meeting was the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which exercises exclusive control over northeast Syria and has for years actively suppressed rivals like the Kurdish National Council (KNC).
The concluding statement, which was framed as the basis for a national dialogue between Kurdish forces and the new administration in Damascus, called for the establishment of a decentralised democratic state in Syria, with guarantees for Kurdish rights and the creation of new governorates with a Kurdish majority. The Syrian administration’s response was immediate, noting that while it affirmed Kurdish rights based on full citizenship and legal equality, it rejected any attempt to impose divisions with the creation of federal or autonomous entities absent a national consensus and warned that the SDF’s actions and statements threatened the country’s unity and territorial integrity.
The conference came on the heels of the framework agreement concluded on 10 March between SDF commander Mazloum Abdi and Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa. That agreement recognised Kurds as a community and guaranteed their political and civil rights as Syrian citizens, rejected calls for partition, and, crucially, provided for the integration of civilian and military institutions—including oil and gas fields—in northeast Syria into the state administration.
For the SDF, the agreement offered protection from then-imminent Turkish attacks and set it up as Damascus’s primary Kurdish interlocutor in the dialogue on the future of the Syrian Kurdish issue. For the government in Damascus, it staved off bloodshed and gave it some breathing room to pursue reunification efforts and build the Syrian state. The agreement provided for a joint committee to oversee implementation of its actionable provisions, leaving aside sensitive matters for further talks.
While positive steps have been taken under the agreement, the SDF has yet to take any concrete action to return the oil and gas fields to Syrian state control, which is critical to meeting the country’s energy needs. Now, the Qamishli conference suggests a break with the spirit of the Abdi-Sharaa agreement and the hope for a peaceful settlement of the Syrian Kurdish question.
Abdi’s defenders say that he has not reneged on the agreement, but that he operates in a highly fragmented Kurdish environment over which he does not have effective control. They argue that the Qamishli statement should be seen as the ceiling of Kurdish demands, which will no doubt be lowered in the final negotiations with Damascus. The leadership of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, which has close ties to the KNC, offered a similarly optimistic reading.
The reality of Syrian Kurdish fragmentation, however, and the uncompromising language of the Qamishli statement, may complicate matters. Clearly, one or more parties in Qamishli viewed the new Syrian leadership’s preoccupation with the situation in Sweida as an opportunity to redouble the pressure on Damascus and attempt to secure additional gains.
Another major obstacle to a settlement is decentralization, whether administrative or political, an idea that seems to dominate the Syrian Kurdish political landscape. Yet, the new Syrian administration, no matter how much pressure it faces, will not accept a federal system, which it sees as tantamount to the partition of Syria, though decentralisation could just mean the establishment of municipalities with significant local powers; it need not lead to autonomous self-rule.
At the same time, developments in the broader Kurdish arena could have a positive impact in Syria, particularly given reports that the Turkish Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) is on the cusp of laying down its weapons and disbanding. Although the SDF and its main component, the Kurdish Democratic Union Party, say they care little about developments in Turkey, the latter’s ties with the PKK suggest otherwise. Moreover, such a move would have significant implications for Ankara’s position on the Syrian Kurdish question.
All these factors suggest that the optimism surrounding the signing of the 10 March agreement was premature, and that the knots of overlapping, contradictory claims and interests among Kurdish and Syrian national forces, as well as regional and international actors, will make a resolution of the Kurdish issue in Syria more difficult than it seemed at that moment. Nevertheless, rapid changes in the Middle East since the collapse of the former Syrian regime may serve to clear many obstacles standing in the way. In any case, much depends on the actions of Syrian Kurdish leaders and the extent to which they grasp the significance of the major transformation wrought by the victory of revolutionary forces in Syria.
*This is a summary of a policy brief originally written in Arabic available here.