Syrian opposition excludes Syrian Kurds

two prominent Syrian Kurdish political parties and a Syriac party have broken away from the Syrian internal opposition's main umbrella group.

QAMISHLO, Syrian Kurdistan (K24) – On Thursday, two prominent Syrian Kurdish political parties and a Syriac party have broken away from the Syrian internal opposition's main umbrella group.

The Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) along with two other parties froze their membership in the Syrian Opposition Coordination Body, which is known as the National Coordination Committee for the Forces of Democratic Change (NCC).

Speaking to K24 from Qamishlo, Sihanouk Dibo, the presidential adviser to PYD said, "Many reasons led us to freeze our membership in NCC. The most important one to us is that many NCC members designated the Syrian Kurdish forces of People's Protection Units (YPG) as terrorists."

PYD said in a statement published on Thursday, "We have been the founders of the Syrian Opposition Coordination Body, and our goal is achieving a democratic Syria for all the Syrians regardless of their ethnicity or sects, but recently many members of the Body have demeaned our achievements in Rojava [Syrian Kurdistan], including the victories of People's Protection Units (YPG), Women Protection Units (YPJ), and Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in fighting against terrorism."

"Furthermore, many NCC members considered our alliance with the international coalition for fighting terrorism with a sense of extremism, such as referring to the Kurdish-U.S. alliance as separatism or treason," the statement read.

The statement also said that the NCC’s inclusion of the Kurdish forces of YPG, YPJ and SDF in the list of terrorism and demeaning their victories against IS violates the ethics and noble goals of struggle against terrorism.

NCC, also known as National Coordination Body for Democratic Change (NCB), is a Syrian coalition of non-armed opposition parties and figures based in Syria. NCC was formed in 2011 at a congress in Damascus to unite the demands of the opposition and organize political dialogue and peaceful anti-regime protests. Recently, NCC attempted to freeze out the Syrian Kurds, whose fighters have already driven the Islamic State (IS) out of much of northern Syria.