Sharaa slams 'slowdown' in SDF integration deal

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Syria’s interim president Ahmed al-Sharaa on Monday criticized delays in implementing a landmark deal to integrate the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) into state institutions, suggesting the hold-up stems from separatist ambitions presented as decentralization. He also claimed that Kurds make up only a quarter of the population in the Kurdish-majority northeast Syria (Rojava).

Speaking at the 2025 Concordia Annual Summit in New York, Sharaa censured the stalled implementation of the March 10 agreement he inked with SDF chief Mazloum Abdi. The deal aims to integrate “all civil and military institutions” in Rojava under the command of the Syrian state and to enforce a “ceasefire across all Syrian territory.”

“There is a slowdown in implementing the March 10 agreement,” Sharaa said. In a veiled criticism of the SDF, he added, “Organizations cannot control all the members they comprise, and they have some decentralization ambitions, which in reality mean division.”

He warned that any effort aimed at preserving the SDF’s structure as is, would “put the region at great risk and may lead to a large-scale war” and could also “put Iraq and Turkey at great risk, as well as the Syrian state.”

While the US-backed March 10 agreement has been partially implemented, serious disagreements between Damascus and the SDF remain. The key sticking point is the two sides’ interpretation of the word “integration.” While the Kurdish-led forces seek to join the Syrian forces as a unified bloc, Damascus prefers to individually absorb and assimilate Kurdish fighters into the national army.

Sharaa’s remarks notably come a day after the Kurdish-led administration in Rojava on Sunday firmly rejected accusations of separatism, asserting that it has never called for secession.

In a statement on X, the Democratic Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (DAANES) emphasized that since its establishment, it “has not issued a single official statement calling for secession” from the Syrian state.

The administration censured “accusations of separatism” by some Syrian officials as “not based on factual evidence” and not reflective of its “declared position.”

Sharaa on Monday also claimed that Arabs form a majority in the country’s northeast, estimating that “approximately 70 to 75 percent of the population [is Arab] and 25 percent of the population is Kurdish.”

Estimates place Syria’s Kurdish population at between 2.5 and 3.6 million - around 10 percent of the country’s population. Kurds, Syria’s largest non-Arab ethnic minority, are concentrated in three non-contiguous enclaves in Rojava. There are also sizable Kurdish communities in major cities like Damascus and Aleppo.

For decades under the Ba’ath regime, Kurds were subjected to systemic Arabization policies, including bans on the Kurdish language in schools and public life.

In March, Sharaa signed a 53-article constitutional declaration that stipulates the country’s president must be an Arab Muslim and reinforced Arabic as the sole official language. The constitution further maintained the name of the country as the Syrian Arab Republic, with a five-year transitional period outlined.

Kurdish parties in Syria have criticized the constitutional declaration as exclusionary, arguing that it marginalizes Kurds by ignoring their distinct ethnic identity. Many have even drawn parallels to Ba’ath-era Arabization policies. Moreover, the document’s emphasis on a highly centralized government is seen as a direct threat to the decentralized, self-administered system established in Rojava.

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