July 17, 2025 • 33 mins
James is joined by Wladimir Van Wilgenburg to discuss the recent disarmament ceremony conducted by the PKK, the fighting between the Syrian Government and Druze people, and the future of the Kurdish freedom movement in Rojava.
Follow Wladimir: https://x.com/vvanwilgenburg
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
A media.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Hi everyone, and welcome. What could happen here?
Speaker 1 (00:08):
It is a second episode about Kurdistan. I am very
lucky to be joined today by Vladimir van Wilgeenberg, who
many of you will know is a journalist covering Kurdistan,
has done excellent work for a lot of publications.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
So welcome to the show of Vladimir. Thanks so much
for invitation.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
Yeah, thanks thanks for being willing to join us so
late at night your time. Let's start off by discussing
an event you attended or the event you were in
proximity too. By the sounds of it, people will have
seen this online, I'm sure, but it was the disarmament
of a number of PKK garrillas that took place in
(00:48):
the mountains of southern Kurdistan over the weekend of the
tenth to twelfth of July.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
So yeah, a few days ago, well, I tried to
attend the ceremony from for the biggilas that were disarming.
Basically what happened is that they burned their weapons, although
technically it's not really possible to burn a weapon because
there were this colossicals. Basically that they were put they
put in a fire and it was in like actually
(01:14):
a tourist cave near doc Kan, so this is not
It was actually very different because I also have been
in during the peace process. I've also was in a
press conference of the pik a K in two thousand
fourteen or fifteen or some of that around that time,
and that was very different because it was basically in
the area that the PIKAK is activated. It was in
(01:35):
the area under their control, but this was under a
different Kurdish parties control. It's called the patriarch Union of Kurdistan.
So in Iraqi Kurdistan, you have two main parties, the
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and you have the Kurdistan Democratic Party.
So this cave where they did the ceremony, which is
actually a tourist cave, it's in PK controlled area, so
(01:58):
the ceremony was sort of protected by PUK security forces.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Yeah, and that's why.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Also the PUK media they got a lot of special access,
and also there was the Turkish government media was there
and also PIKK media was there and a lot of
other Kurdish TV channels.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
So it was a very interesting day.
Speaker 3 (02:17):
Although I was not able to pass the checkpoint towards
the ceremony because at the last moment, actually a few
days before the ceremony, they.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
Changed the access.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
Supposedly it will be a very open ceremony, but then
they said because of security reasons that they had to
restrict the ceremony and there would be some TV screens
and stuff. And then I couldn't find the TV screens.
But that's another discussion. But I also don't still understand
what the security risk was. Although a day before there
was a drone strike on a Kurdish Peshmarga base, but
(02:49):
it was like quite far away from that. It was
one hour away from the ceremony location.
Speaker 1 (02:54):
Yeah, and it's an Iranian durned to jake great like
a Shahi drone.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
Yeah, So there have been like no group has these attacks.
But in the aftermath of the Twelve Day War, there
have been a lot of drawn strikes in the Kurdistan
region in various areas, including this morning on American Oil
Company's facility in the Hawk Province and the day before
that also on another field near Airbill.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
So it has been quite tense yeh.
Speaker 3 (03:22):
Which also probably affected the ceremony, although it's not really
related to it.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Yeah, it's different.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
So yeah, basically what was interesting. So they have this
peace process between Kurdish rebels and the Turkish state.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
It's all started with a.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
Call by a Turkish ultra nationalist leader which actually in
the past actually called for executing of the Logeland. The
leader of the Kurdistan Workers Party has been in prison
since the nineties. He was actually surprisingly starting this peace process.
He was saying like we should have him talked in
the parliament and call for disbanding the pik a K.
(03:58):
So he never came to the parliament, but he released
messages from prison, and before the ceremony he released also
a video message where he again focused on disarming basically,
and then the ceremony basically came where you have thirty fighters,
fifteen women, fifteen men, because the PIKK is all about
(04:20):
woman equality, so that's why they did it fifty to
fifty and they put their weapons in this fire. So
I think this also sacrifice a point of renewal because
Kurts as a tradition, they have this Kurdish New Year
every year on twenty one March where people jump over fires.
There's a lot of fireworks and the Kurdish and Atros
(04:40):
is basically the start of a new beginning. Yeah, so
I think one of the reasons they chose these fires
is because of this idea of a new beginning, and
also the fact that when the PICAK started, there were
people that sort of the creators of the PIKK. There
are actually some of them they burned themselves in prison
in the in the Turkish prison. Yeah, so it's also
(05:03):
sort of related to that.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
This sort of interlinks with a fire. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:09):
And you also saw that they carefully put the weapons
in the fire, they didn't just throw them. So it's
it doesn't mean that they have completely given up on weapons,
because they're still waiting on counter steps from the Turkish government.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
Yeah, Like there has been fighting between p KK or
hPG or how you want to say it, like hPG
being like the technically the armed wing. There's been fighting
in southern Kurdistan, like the in Iraqi kig Kerdistan Autonomous
Region of Iraq since the call for peace right, like,
(05:44):
there has been ongoing fighting.
Speaker 3 (05:46):
Yeah, I mean it's not really I would not say
that it's like like actively fighting to take territory, yes,
which was happening before. So it's more that it's some
like Turkish armies shooting artillery on the PIKK, and there
was also one incident that the Pikk actually responded by drones.
(06:06):
But so far this didn't reach much in the Turkish
or the Kurdish media. I mean they were like, some
of this artillery shelling costs some fires, so villagers in
the areas it's a very hot summer now, they were
trying to put out the fires.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
But it was not like the active, active fighting that.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
You had before, okay, And you know, since there was
also a previous peace process. I mean, there have been
several peace processes since history between the Pikk and Turkey,
but they never had a positive result. And last one
before this song was twenty fifteen. And after that peace
process broke down when two policemen were shot. It's still
(06:43):
unclear who shot those policemen. The fighting erupted again and
since then there have been heavy fighting, first in the
Kurdish majority areas of Turkey until basically Turkey defeated Kurdish
armed insurgents in the Kurdish cities in Turkey, and since
then actually the fighting has moved more to Iraqi, Kurdistan,
(07:04):
where the PIKK has also a historical presence.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Is the nineties.
Speaker 3 (07:08):
But what you now have is that we have this
new piece process started by this call of bats Shelley
and the big AKA leader O Johan has said the
time for armed struggle is over. We don't want to
have a Kurdish date. So basically what now is happening
is that the Kurdish Pikak and the Kurdish political counterpart
(07:30):
in Turkey, they're basically waiting for steps by Turkey now
to give them basically trust to continue this process.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
And there was also a speech by.
Speaker 3 (07:39):
The Turkish president Erdoland where he was also saying that
it's the end. We don't need anymore. We need to talk.
It's not a time for weapons anymore. We spend trillions
of dollars on the war against the Pikak. We had
this a lot of martyrs and we sacrificed a lot,
and it's now the time to stop the war and
(08:01):
to do talking. And he said they're gonna work with
the Kurdish Party and this ultra Turkish nationalist party the
MHP in the parliament and to also set up a
commission to basically work on constitutional changes.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Yeah, let's take a break for adverts here and then
we'll come back. All right, we are back. I guess
we should talk briefly about like the nature of this,
this call for piece. You explained very well that this
(08:36):
is probably a higher chance of success than that has
ever been right, Like, we have the explicit buying of Ojulan,
who hasn't been seen on video since the nineties, so
like to have him making a video statement, it's quite significant.
I'm sure he's been seen on video, but like not
not like making a speech, right, and then that we
have like this this endorsement in the Turkish Parliament. Like,
(08:57):
I think there's been a lot of speculation about what
led to this, and some of it's not particularly helpful.
But you know, you're very well educated on these matters.
What do you think this means for not just the
PKK but the k c K. I guess, like the
Kurdish Freedom movement, that the different movements throughout kurtis down
they are inspired by the political thought of Aujilan.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
Well, I mean, until now, it's difficult to say what
exactly is going to happen because the BIKK said they're
going to go there will disarm. But there's other groups
which are linked to the big K in Iran Iran
and in Syria and also for instance Sinjar, those groups
said they were not Some of them have said publicly
(09:40):
that we're not part of this process or they walk
on the process, and others they didn't really say much
to this group, haven't said really a lot. Yeah, so
it's also going to be interesting what will happen with
those groups, with the Iranian Kurdish group and also with
the Serian democratic forces in Syria that have a different
situation also after the fall of so they have these
(10:00):
stocks with Omascus. And actually one of the reasons that
the first peace process broke down was because that in
actually at that time also that Turkey was a little
bit afraid of this alliance between the Kurds and the
Americans at the time against ISIS that was then rising
up in Syria and attacked the Kurdish town of Coban
in Syria, which created an alliance between the Kurds and
(10:23):
the US against the ISIS terrorists militant jihadi group.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
But now the situation actually is interesting.
Speaker 3 (10:31):
So at that time the Curds were empowered in Syria,
but now you can see there's a completely different situation
now the opposite way. So now you have the rebels
that took over Damascus and they are now the government
run by Jiulani his previous name, who's now called himself
antal Shada his real name. So they now have a
(10:51):
new Islamist controlled government and Damascus, and there's a lot
of tension between the curts in Syria and Theamascus. So
this could also risk basically this peace process with Turkey
because the SDF they have also ideological ins with the
pik Ak, so it's also interesting how this will work out.
So in the past it was also always like the
(11:12):
fighting between Turkey and the Pikak could threaten the SDF Assyria,
but sort of the other way around that fighting between
possible fighting in the future between Damascus and the Curtain Syria,
it could threaten the peace process in Turkey and Erdolan.
He made this very big speech not a very long
time ago where he mentioned that Turkey doesn't only want
piece for the curse in Turkey and for Alla Whites
(11:34):
also a religious minority in Turkey, but he was also
talking that he wants piece for the curse in Syria
and also in Iraq, that they should also live like
a prosperous life in Syria, and that they have good
relations with the Sieran government. So I think that's also
a very interesting point that you don't see in many articles,
that there's like this very big interlinkage between all these
different tissues.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Yeah, and I think Turkey has maintained that the SDF
is the peak KK, right, just with like a different badge,
which is not the case. They share a lot of politics,
but they're distinct. Turkey also has like extensive proxy forces
in Syria. Right, there have been fighting with the SDF
since I guess late well, I mean for years, but
(12:18):
like in an expanded sense, since since the beginning of
the fall of the Asad regime that we saw like
probably seven or eight months ago.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
Now, it's a very complex situation.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
It's also as we record this today on the fifteenth,
Syria is a very diverse country and add to all
the groups you mentioned, there is currently fighting between the
government and Dru's militias. Right, can you explain a little
bit about the situation there and the relevance of that.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
Well, I mean the Druze they are a religious community
that are not same as the Sunni Muslims, and they
control their own area on the border the town called
Sweda and the villages around it, and also they have
some areas in Damascus where they have their presence.
Speaker 2 (13:07):
Yeah, so the Drews basically during the time where.
Speaker 3 (13:10):
The Assad regime still was in power, they didn't really
like fight very heavily against the Assad regime in the beginning,
but they didn't allow the Assad regime to recruit military
recruit people in their area and they sort of tried
to keep the regime out of their area. So during
the civil war they were sort of semi autonomous, but
not officially.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
And actually in the last years before.
Speaker 3 (13:32):
The fall Offasad, they were like a big protests in
the Drews areas in support of the Syrian Revolution and
against the Assaut regimes. So they were like very big
protests in the Druze areas against the Assaut regime. So
when the Assad regime was militarily weakening and the rebels
from the other side of Syria they were attacking the
Assad regime, the Drews they also joined the fight and
(13:54):
they marched together with the Southern rebels. They marched on
to Moscus, and they were actually the first one that
entered the Mouscus, not not the ahmtal Shada or the Hts.
Actually the first ones that entered the Moscus was the
Southern rebels and the Drews.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
But but there's this thing.
Speaker 3 (14:12):
Is that the Moscus wants to have this this new
regime or the new government in the Muscus. They want
to have this very centralized system, so they don't want
the Drews to run their own armed groups and they
have their own sort of local autonomy, so they have
They have been fighting before between the Drews and the
new authorities in Syria in areas near Theamascus, but there
(14:35):
was like a ceasefire and the fighting stopped. But recently
there's also like historical tensions between these Arab Bedouin tribes
and the Drews in the area.
Speaker 2 (14:44):
So these areas are quite mixed. So there's actually this
this recent conflict.
Speaker 3 (14:49):
They started when Biduan tribes they they robbed like a
merchant who was a Druce and then after that they
were like mutual kidnapping like tensions between both. And then
basically although the Moscus said they were neutral, the Mascus
started to support these Bedouin groups against the Drus and
started marching on on Sueda, which is the the Drew
(15:10):
stronghold on the border.
Speaker 2 (15:13):
And so actually there have been like.
Speaker 3 (15:15):
A few days, not even a few days, but have
been like a short period of fighting now. And actually Damascus,
they they entered this druze town of Sueda and they
actually said, okay, we control the town now, and now
we're going to withdraw the Serian army and then the
internal security force is going to control the city. That
very shortly after Israel started bombing heavily the cern armed
(15:41):
forces of the new Sirn government and then the Drews
armed groups they sort of pushed back and they pushed
out this internal security force out of the city. And
now the Drews are, according to many reports, back in
control of the city of Zuida. And now you see
that just like what happened with the Alla Whites when
there was this Asad regime remnants that they had uprising
(16:04):
against the new authorities. And then they were like these rebels.
They were mobilized with mosks all over Syria and they
went to the coast areas and they defeated those Asad
regime remnants, but they killed also a lot of civilians
some reports over fifteen hundred people. So what you now
see is that the Damascus is against mobilizing those people with.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Mosques to march on Zueda.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
But the difference is with the other whites is that
Israel also has Drews, so there's also pressure on the
Israeli government to support the drew So it's not only
because of their strategic interests, it's also because there are
Drews living in Israel itself that also have joined the
Israeli army, so they're also pushing Israel for taking action.
(16:47):
So you saw that today, like Israel, they took a
lot of they carried out a lot of air strikes,
and the Drews that are basically back in control of
most of the Sueda city, not of the whole area.
But the fight is not all real yet. And then
you also have different rustractions. Some of them they have
better relations with Damascus, the majority of them don't. So
(17:07):
now we're going to see if there's going to be fighting,
if the fighting is going to increase again. We've seen
our reports as of that the HDS or the the
Moscus government forces that are using drones strikes by themselves
on RUS forces, so they're using basically the drones that
they used to overthrow the us UT regime.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
Okay, so yeah, that's the situation.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
Yeah, I think the world stopped looking at Syria. I mean,
I guess the world stop looking at Syria a while ago,
like really, after the defeat of the Territorial Calipate. It's
been much harder to sell stories in big newspapers in
the United States. But yeah, it's by no means, like
the fighting is not over and it leaves their SDF
(17:48):
Western Kurdistan branch of this Kurdish movement right, like in
as you said, a fairly perilous condition. Right, the Damascus
wants to centralize. I think they want to They don't
want to have independent they don't want to have like
federated autonomy. The United States seems to be, at least
(18:09):
the United States envoy to Damascus seems to be making
statements that suggests that, like the only way forward is
through centralization. On one hand, we have the PKK alene
(18:29):
Gan arm. The other hand, we have the SDF in
its difficult position. Where does this leave, like the Kurdish
Freedom Movement. I think this has been the thing that
a lot of people all over the world have looked
up to. Right, people have especially rich Ava as this
example that people could build something, a place where freedom
could exist in the middle of this terrible war in Syria.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
Do you think the movement's like in danger now?
Speaker 3 (18:51):
Well, I mean you have this new government in Syria. Actually,
and in initially to Trump administration was quite reluctant to
have relations with the new authorities in Damascus because they
were I mean, Joolani used to be on a Amachada,
used to be on a terrorist sanctioned list.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
Yeah, there was a bounty for him at one point,
it wasn't there.
Speaker 3 (19:12):
Yeah, But I think there was like a very intensive
love being by some Gulf states and Turkey to basically
remove the sanctions on not a shot at Jolani, but
also remove sanctions on Syria that the economic sanctions that
were actually were on the Asaturgy. So I think the
Trump administration changed their position, and also a new ambassador
for Syria and Turkey was appointed, so he was not
(19:34):
only the bassador Turkey but also for Syria, and he's
basically echoing a lot of the points of the new
authorities in Damascus that they was talking about one state,
one army, one days, one days, and the SEF should
be integrated and blah blah blah.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
So there was there.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
Was also recently there were talks between Theamascus and the
STF because in March they reached an agreement with Western
support and they were trying to basically make them or
finalized agreement in recently a few days ago, they had
these talks in Damascus and the French were there, and
the Brits were there, and Americans were there. But this
agreement was not implemented, it didn't lead to anything, so
(20:14):
it was not really it didn't really work very well
because the Moscus is insisting on this centralized state. And
I was just listening to Kurdish sharing Kurdish official and
she was also saying like, we don't want to separate
from Syria, but we want to have some form of
local councils and a decentralized Syria and not like a
centralized Syria. And she was also talking about what happened
(20:35):
to the Jews, that it's not a very good example
for the future of Syria. Yeah, so I think definitely
what you're saying that there is a sort of a
threat because in the past he was very supportive of
the SDF in the fight against Isis, although they didn't
support so much their political project, but they supported them
because they fought Isis. And also they were keeping out
(20:57):
Iranian backed malicious from areas like the resor. But now
you don't have me run anymore. In Syria, they were
completely kicked out after the fall of the Acet regime.
All these militias they have been disbanded or hiding or
some of them actually now being used by the Muscus.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
Against the Druze.
Speaker 3 (21:12):
So doubt that argument is not there anymore that you okay,
we have the SDF, they keep out the I ran
from the oil fields. Yeah, you could still argue you
have still have the fight against ICES, I mean ICES.
Speaker 2 (21:23):
Is still fred.
Speaker 3 (21:24):
Yeah, but the Curts don't have that same leverage anymore
as is in the past that they said, okay, we're
the main ones fighting ISS, we keep out the run
from these areas because now you have THEMSCUS. The Moscus said,
why the kurt should do that, Like, let's us take
over those prisons and the camps where you have these
thousands of Isis families and ICES prisoners, and we don't
(21:45):
need the Curds to run the ICES. Well, we can
do that for you. So I think that's now, Like
the big issue is that the US seems to be
more supporting the Moscus at these diplomatically than the SDF,
although military speaking, the support is still going on for
the SDF until twenty twenty six in the last Entergon
(22:06):
budget which was not accepted yet they're still like millions
of support for the SDF to to maintain the prisons
and this.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
Kind of stuff. So I think it's it's it's a.
Speaker 1 (22:16):
Difficult situation, yeah, that these prisons like our whole and others, right,
like they there, I guess kind of the only leverage
the FDF has with the United States where they along
with the continuing and somewhat increasing ISIS attacks, but that's
still much less of a threat to the US than
(22:37):
it was ten years ago, say, right, Like, it's it's
much less of a significant thing. So, like what is
the status of those prisons that currently they're still guided
by the SDF, right, but the people aren't familiar. Can
you just explain what those prisons consist of and like
who's in there and who's guiding them?
Speaker 3 (22:56):
Well, so IS has credit this jihadi state between twenty
fourteen and twenty nineteen, but then the Kurdish led SDF.
They basically took most of these areas under ISIS control.
They defeated basically ISIS with the support of the US,
so they lost the territory. And the last battle basically
was for a small town called Bajus and the Rezor.
(23:18):
So you had all these ISIS families there, and also
there were like several ISIS foreign members that were captured,
so you have the wives of ISIS fighters and you
also have IIS fighters themselves that were captured during these battles.
So all these people they were brought to camps. So
I was there in Syria many times. For instance, during
the battle for Raka, which was used to be the
(23:40):
capital of the ISIS Caliphate, they were like bringing the
ISIS families and women to a camp in I know Lisa.
But after that they moved most of those people to
actually move almost all of them to the Roche camp
and all hold camp in northern Syria in the Hassaka province.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
And also that includes foreigners.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
You can imagine people from Uzbek Kistan, from Uihus from China,
people from Turkey, French people, European people, so it's full
of a lot of different people, and then the majority
are actually Iraqis and Syrians, so the sea they have
this foul they a majority. Like a lot of people
(24:20):
in those camps, they have been repatriated or they have
to return to their homes. So I think those camps
like a whole camp, like the prison. It's not a prison,
it's the camp. I think like the number of people
that are basically decreased almost fifty percent, but there are
still a lot of people inside. But the prisons you
have still all these Isis spiders that were in prison
during the war, and a lot of them are foreigners,
(24:42):
including Dutch another country. You know, some countries they have
returned there, they have returned their people there. So we
have some people, you know, America they took back most
of the families and the fighters and they prosecute them
in the US. But you also have countries that didn't
bring back the fighters, for instance, only brought back the woman.
So that's the situation that all those people are still there.
(25:05):
And it's actually what you mentioned that it's like one
of the big reasons for support for the SDF, and
it's also one of the reasons that the SDF is
getting millions to keep those prisons in good shape because
they have been also attims by isis to free those
prisoners from those prisons.
Speaker 1 (25:20):
Basically, yeah, in successful attempts in twenty twenty, twenty twenty two,
I think it was when they had the last like
major prison escape, which, yeah, it's a bad thing for
our world if if all those all those people get out,
and like you say, lots of European nations, I think
it's something that I wish Americans had paid more attention to,
(25:43):
because I think that European nations have done the United
Kingdom being a paramount example, is like rendered some of
those people stateless, right that they've removed in this case,
Shmima Bagoom is probably the most well known example. Right,
they've removed her British passport and now she doesn't have
a state. She's stateless. It's something that the US has
(26:04):
recently done to people living in the United States, and
like it does feel something as if you know that
the president has been established and now it's being carried out,
and it's obviously deeply concerning to see it happening here
after like it happened there that wish people had opposed
it when it did.
Speaker 3 (26:24):
Well I mean the US, in the US itself in
Syria was very a big advocate of bringing the people out, Yes,
it was, Yeah, because it will make it easier for.
Speaker 2 (26:33):
Them to withdraw.
Speaker 3 (26:34):
So they were actually pushing those countries that didn't want
to bring back there are nationals to basically bring them back,
like Western countries, the UK and others. Yeah, but some
of these countries were actually forced by court orders or others.
But a lot of these counties were actually quite reluctant
to bring them back because they're afraid of like security
risk and stuff, or that they will be released quite
quickly and then they would again like be active and
(26:58):
jihadist activity.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
Yeah. Yeah, so US was very so.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
I remember that the US was even offering like members
of this Coalition against ISIS which was created in twenty fourteen.
Like she said, if you cannot bring them yourself, I
mean we can, our military can help you to bring
those people out. If you think that you it's it's
difficult for you to go to Syria and pick those
nationals up from your accounts.
Speaker 1 (27:21):
Yeah, yeah, been pretty unsuccessful, like in a lot of
well in some European cases they have, but still, yeah,
lots of them utterly refusing to do it. I wonder
then as we finish up here, right, like we spoke
about this PKK disarmament, obviously it's a symbolic disarmament, right
there is still I don't quite know how big the
hPG is, but it's much bigger than thirty people. And
(27:43):
then the weapons they laid down were like a very
small percentage of their weapons. Were they just burning like kalashnikov?
So did they burn like larger weapons too.
Speaker 3 (27:54):
No, it was just their personal collagicals basically. Okay, yeah,
I mean it was also like more symbol like symbolic ceremony,
like we are willing to give up. But the thing
is that also it's still not clear what happened to
those thirty people.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
Are they going to go back to Turkey, That's what
I wanted to ask, Yeah, are.
Speaker 3 (28:11):
They going to stay in Iraqi Curdistan and find a
job there? Because you have people like that in Iraqi
Kurdistan that used to be with the pigger k and
that now they work in I don't know, in media
or construction sector or entertainment sector. You have people like that,
But there's not much clarity on that. But I think
also that's because they're waiting on Turkey to make possible
(28:32):
constitutional steps, you know, to see what Turkey is going
to do, because for instance, Turkey could offer an amnesty
or the kind of things, then those people could return.
And also some of them were saying like now it's
the end of weapons, but we still want to be
involved in.
Speaker 2 (28:45):
Politics, right through the political party.
Speaker 3 (28:47):
So it's also possible that those people want to go
back to Turkey and basically take part in Kurdish politics
or Turkish politics to be more corrected in Turkey. So
I think it's a little bit too early to say
what happened with those people, because I remember also if
I very much corrected, they're also having peace process that
basically people have given basically went to the border and
(29:07):
give themselves up to Turkey. But that didn't happen now,
so it's a bit different than in the past. Yeah,
but it seems that the Turkish government was very happy
with the ceremony. They didn't complain about it.
Speaker 1 (29:18):
So okay, yeah, yeah, I wondered what happened. So those
guerrillas or former guerrillas I suppose, who laid down their
weapons at the end of the ceremony, they just kind
of returned to the mountains or whatever.
Speaker 2 (29:30):
We don't know what will happen with them now.
Speaker 3 (29:32):
That's that's not clear to me because there are still
some unanswered questions like what you mentioned now, like what
those thirty people did, Yeah, what those people are going
to do now?
Speaker 1 (29:42):
So right, there's a lot of people, and it's a
lot of people, some of whom have spent decades as
cadra of the revolution, right they have they haven't really
known life outside of the revolution for a very long time.
Speaker 3 (29:56):
Yeah, so it's so a bit difficult for them to
return to civilian life because I mean because they probably
joined when they're quite young, and I think I was
also the profiles of the people of the thirty people
will burn their weapons that a lot of them they
joined in the nineties. Wow, so they have been in
they have been in the mountains for a very long time. Yeah,
I mean some of them were young, but there were
(30:17):
also older people among them. But definitely it's going to
be a question what will happen with those people, although
I mean they were also talked that some leadership of
the armed Pikak movement might go to Europe and get
asylum there.
Speaker 2 (30:31):
Yeah, Instead of going back to Turkey.
Speaker 3 (30:33):
Yeah, you know, you have also a lot of courage
the asport or organizations active there, so they could like
basically embrace those people.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
Yeah, but they're still listed as a foreign terrorist organization
in most two Yeah exactly.
Speaker 3 (30:46):
I mean, for instance, they probably would want to have
something like what the Syrian president have now Ahmatoshada that
he used to be listed as a sanctioned as a
terrorist organization and then to have that removed. But I'm
sure that that's not on the table anytime soon.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
But that happened with the HTS.
Speaker 3 (31:02):
But also it t happened for instance much Hulk and
Uranian opposition group they also got delisted. So it's technically
as possible. But I think we are like in a
very early stage of the peace process. So that's why
I think it's going to take time before we have
more clarity and some of these answers that questions you ask, now,
I mean most of the people that attended the ceremony
(31:22):
didn't have an answer to that too, because there was
not much clarity on that because it was just a ceremony.
There was like a statement. Journals were not able to
talk to most of the journalists. I mean there was
like some statement in some Kurdish media, but in general,
like they were not able to talk to those fighters,
like now, what are you going to do? There was
not like access to those thirty people that burned their weapons,
(31:44):
so it was like sort of quite very much controlled ceremony.
It was very difficult to report on it basically, which
is very different from the previous peace process when it
was much more open. But that time there was not
like forty fighters giving up their weapons. They just had
like sort of a press conference, is what we I'm
gonna do? And that was very different than what happened now.
Speaker 1 (32:04):
Yeah, yeah, it gets it's a big just to keep watching.
It's fascinating to watch it unfold. Like I was in
Curdish Down a year and a half ago, and it
is competed, it's seen. The situation is completely different likewise
in the whole of Syria. So yeah, it's fascinating to watch.
I'm sure if people want to know more about it.
You're very good at reporting on this. You often post
(32:26):
on Twitter about the situation, and you write for a
number of outlets. So how can people follow your work?
Speaker 3 (32:32):
Well, the best place to follow my workers on Twitter
on x X because I'm quite active there, but also
I write for places like Middle East I something thanks
like watching the Institute New a Liance Institute. I also
write for a Kurdish magazine called Kurtist thank Chronicle, and
also I pitched for other websites, so I'm quite active
(32:55):
on different issues, but mostly focused on things related to Kurts,
mostly stuff related to Iran, Turkey, Siria.
Speaker 2 (33:03):
It's inter Yeah, well, thank you so much for joining us.
We really appreciate your insight. You're welcome, my friend. It
Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media.
Speaker 3 (33:14):
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
coolzonmedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Speaker 2 (33:25):
You can now find sources for It Could Happen Here.
Listened directly in episode descriptions.
Speaker 1 (33:29):
Thanks for listening.
A media.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Hi everyone, and welcome. What could happen here?
Speaker 1 (00:08):
It is a second episode about Kurdistan. I am very
lucky to be joined today by Vladimir van Wilgeenberg, who
many of you will know is a journalist covering Kurdistan,
has done excellent work for a lot of publications.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
So welcome to the show of Vladimir. Thanks so much
for invitation.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
Yeah, thanks thanks for being willing to join us so
late at night your time. Let's start off by discussing
an event you attended or the event you were in
proximity too. By the sounds of it, people will have
seen this online, I'm sure, but it was the disarmament
of a number of PKK garrillas that took place in
(00:48):
the mountains of southern Kurdistan over the weekend of the
tenth to twelfth of July.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
So yeah, a few days ago, well, I tried to
attend the ceremony from for the biggilas that were disarming.
Basically what happened is that they burned their weapons, although
technically it's not really possible to burn a weapon because
there were this colossicals. Basically that they were put they
put in a fire and it was in like actually
(01:14):
a tourist cave near doc Kan, so this is not
It was actually very different because I also have been
in during the peace process. I've also was in a
press conference of the pik a K in two thousand
fourteen or fifteen or some of that around that time,
and that was very different because it was basically in
the area that the PIKAK is activated. It was in
(01:35):
the area under their control, but this was under a
different Kurdish parties control. It's called the patriarch Union of Kurdistan.
So in Iraqi Kurdistan, you have two main parties, the
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and you have the Kurdistan Democratic Party.
So this cave where they did the ceremony, which is
actually a tourist cave, it's in PK controlled area, so
(01:58):
the ceremony was sort of protected by PUK security forces.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Yeah, and that's why.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Also the PUK media they got a lot of special access,
and also there was the Turkish government media was there
and also PIKK media was there and a lot of
other Kurdish TV channels.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
So it was a very interesting day.
Speaker 3 (02:17):
Although I was not able to pass the checkpoint towards
the ceremony because at the last moment, actually a few
days before the ceremony, they.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
Changed the access.
Speaker 3 (02:26):
Supposedly it will be a very open ceremony, but then
they said because of security reasons that they had to
restrict the ceremony and there would be some TV screens
and stuff. And then I couldn't find the TV screens.
But that's another discussion. But I also don't still understand
what the security risk was. Although a day before there
was a drone strike on a Kurdish Peshmarga base, but
(02:49):
it was like quite far away from that. It was
one hour away from the ceremony location.
Speaker 1 (02:54):
Yeah, and it's an Iranian durned to jake great like
a Shahi drone.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
Yeah, So there have been like no group has these attacks.
But in the aftermath of the Twelve Day War, there
have been a lot of drawn strikes in the Kurdistan
region in various areas, including this morning on American Oil
Company's facility in the Hawk Province and the day before
that also on another field near Airbill.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
So it has been quite tense yeh.
Speaker 3 (03:22):
Which also probably affected the ceremony, although it's not really
related to it.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Yeah, it's different.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
So yeah, basically what was interesting. So they have this
peace process between Kurdish rebels and the Turkish state.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
It's all started with a.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
Call by a Turkish ultra nationalist leader which actually in
the past actually called for executing of the Logeland. The
leader of the Kurdistan Workers Party has been in prison
since the nineties. He was actually surprisingly starting this peace process.
He was saying like we should have him talked in
the parliament and call for disbanding the pik a K.
(03:58):
So he never came to the parliament, but he released
messages from prison, and before the ceremony he released also
a video message where he again focused on disarming basically,
and then the ceremony basically came where you have thirty fighters,
fifteen women, fifteen men, because the PIKK is all about
(04:20):
woman equality, so that's why they did it fifty to
fifty and they put their weapons in this fire. So
I think this also sacrifice a point of renewal because
Kurts as a tradition, they have this Kurdish New Year
every year on twenty one March where people jump over fires.
There's a lot of fireworks and the Kurdish and Atros
(04:40):
is basically the start of a new beginning. Yeah, so
I think one of the reasons they chose these fires
is because of this idea of a new beginning, and
also the fact that when the PICAK started, there were
people that sort of the creators of the PIKK. There
are actually some of them they burned themselves in prison
in the in the Turkish prison. Yeah, so it's also
(05:03):
sort of related to that.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
This sort of interlinks with a fire. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:09):
And you also saw that they carefully put the weapons
in the fire, they didn't just throw them. So it's
it doesn't mean that they have completely given up on weapons,
because they're still waiting on counter steps from the Turkish government.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
Yeah, Like there has been fighting between p KK or
hPG or how you want to say it, like hPG
being like the technically the armed wing. There's been fighting
in southern Kurdistan, like the in Iraqi kig Kerdistan Autonomous
Region of Iraq since the call for peace right, like,
(05:44):
there has been ongoing fighting.
Speaker 3 (05:46):
Yeah, I mean it's not really I would not say
that it's like like actively fighting to take territory, yes,
which was happening before. So it's more that it's some
like Turkish armies shooting artillery on the PIKK, and there
was also one incident that the Pikk actually responded by drones.
(06:06):
But so far this didn't reach much in the Turkish
or the Kurdish media. I mean they were like, some
of this artillery shelling costs some fires, so villagers in
the areas it's a very hot summer now, they were
trying to put out the fires.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
But it was not like the active, active fighting that.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
You had before, okay, And you know, since there was
also a previous peace process. I mean, there have been
several peace processes since history between the Pikk and Turkey,
but they never had a positive result. And last one
before this song was twenty fifteen. And after that peace
process broke down when two policemen were shot. It's still
(06:43):
unclear who shot those policemen. The fighting erupted again and
since then there have been heavy fighting, first in the
Kurdish majority areas of Turkey until basically Turkey defeated Kurdish
armed insurgents in the Kurdish cities in Turkey, and since
then actually the fighting has moved more to Iraqi, Kurdistan,
(07:04):
where the PIKK has also a historical presence.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
Is the nineties.
Speaker 3 (07:08):
But what you now have is that we have this
new piece process started by this call of bats Shelley
and the big AKA leader O Johan has said the
time for armed struggle is over. We don't want to
have a Kurdish date. So basically what now is happening
is that the Kurdish Pikak and the Kurdish political counterpart
(07:30):
in Turkey, they're basically waiting for steps by Turkey now
to give them basically trust to continue this process.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
And there was also a speech by.
Speaker 3 (07:39):
The Turkish president Erdoland where he was also saying that
it's the end. We don't need anymore. We need to talk.
It's not a time for weapons anymore. We spend trillions
of dollars on the war against the Pikak. We had
this a lot of martyrs and we sacrificed a lot,
and it's now the time to stop the war and
(08:01):
to do talking. And he said they're gonna work with
the Kurdish Party and this ultra Turkish nationalist party the
MHP in the parliament and to also set up a
commission to basically work on constitutional changes.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Yeah, let's take a break for adverts here and then
we'll come back. All right, we are back. I guess
we should talk briefly about like the nature of this,
this call for piece. You explained very well that this
(08:36):
is probably a higher chance of success than that has
ever been right, Like, we have the explicit buying of Ojulan,
who hasn't been seen on video since the nineties, so
like to have him making a video statement, it's quite significant.
I'm sure he's been seen on video, but like not
not like making a speech, right, and then that we
have like this this endorsement in the Turkish Parliament. Like,
(08:57):
I think there's been a lot of speculation about what
led to this, and some of it's not particularly helpful.
But you know, you're very well educated on these matters.
What do you think this means for not just the
PKK but the k c K. I guess, like the
Kurdish Freedom movement, that the different movements throughout kurtis down
they are inspired by the political thought of Aujilan.
Speaker 3 (09:19):
Well, I mean, until now, it's difficult to say what
exactly is going to happen because the BIKK said they're
going to go there will disarm. But there's other groups
which are linked to the big K in Iran Iran
and in Syria and also for instance Sinjar, those groups
said they were not Some of them have said publicly
(09:40):
that we're not part of this process or they walk
on the process, and others they didn't really say much
to this group, haven't said really a lot. Yeah, so
it's also going to be interesting what will happen with
those groups, with the Iranian Kurdish group and also with
the Serian democratic forces in Syria that have a different
situation also after the fall of so they have these
(10:00):
stocks with Omascus. And actually one of the reasons that
the first peace process broke down was because that in
actually at that time also that Turkey was a little
bit afraid of this alliance between the Kurds and the
Americans at the time against ISIS that was then rising
up in Syria and attacked the Kurdish town of Coban
in Syria, which created an alliance between the Kurds and
(10:23):
the US against the ISIS terrorists militant jihadi group.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
But now the situation actually is interesting.
Speaker 3 (10:31):
So at that time the Curds were empowered in Syria,
but now you can see there's a completely different situation
now the opposite way. So now you have the rebels
that took over Damascus and they are now the government
run by Jiulani his previous name, who's now called himself
antal Shada his real name. So they now have a
(10:51):
new Islamist controlled government and Damascus, and there's a lot
of tension between the curts in Syria and Theamascus. So
this could also risk basically this peace process with Turkey
because the SDF they have also ideological ins with the
pik Ak, so it's also interesting how this will work out.
So in the past it was also always like the
(11:12):
fighting between Turkey and the Pikak could threaten the SDF Assyria,
but sort of the other way around that fighting between
possible fighting in the future between Damascus and the Curtain Syria,
it could threaten the peace process in Turkey and Erdolan.
He made this very big speech not a very long
time ago where he mentioned that Turkey doesn't only want
piece for the curse in Turkey and for Alla Whites
(11:34):
also a religious minority in Turkey, but he was also
talking that he wants piece for the curse in Syria
and also in Iraq, that they should also live like
a prosperous life in Syria, and that they have good
relations with the Sieran government. So I think that's also
a very interesting point that you don't see in many articles,
that there's like this very big interlinkage between all these
different tissues.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
Yeah, and I think Turkey has maintained that the SDF
is the peak KK, right, just with like a different badge,
which is not the case. They share a lot of politics,
but they're distinct. Turkey also has like extensive proxy forces
in Syria. Right, there have been fighting with the SDF
since I guess late well, I mean for years, but
(12:18):
like in an expanded sense, since since the beginning of
the fall of the Asad regime that we saw like
probably seven or eight months ago.
Speaker 2 (12:28):
Now, it's a very complex situation.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
It's also as we record this today on the fifteenth,
Syria is a very diverse country and add to all
the groups you mentioned, there is currently fighting between the
government and Dru's militias. Right, can you explain a little
bit about the situation there and the relevance of that.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
Well, I mean the Druze they are a religious community
that are not same as the Sunni Muslims, and they
control their own area on the border the town called
Sweda and the villages around it, and also they have
some areas in Damascus where they have their presence.
Speaker 2 (13:07):
Yeah, so the Drews basically during the time where.
Speaker 3 (13:10):
The Assad regime still was in power, they didn't really
like fight very heavily against the Assad regime in the beginning,
but they didn't allow the Assad regime to recruit military
recruit people in their area and they sort of tried
to keep the regime out of their area. So during
the civil war they were sort of semi autonomous, but
not officially.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
And actually in the last years before.
Speaker 3 (13:32):
The fall Offasad, they were like a big protests in
the Drews areas in support of the Syrian Revolution and
against the Assaut regimes. So they were like very big
protests in the Druze areas against the Assaut regime. So
when the Assad regime was militarily weakening and the rebels
from the other side of Syria they were attacking the
Assad regime, the Drews they also joined the fight and
(13:54):
they marched together with the Southern rebels. They marched on
to Moscus, and they were actually the first one that
entered the Mouscus, not not the ahmtal Shada or the Hts.
Actually the first ones that entered the Moscus was the
Southern rebels and the Drews.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
But but there's this thing.
Speaker 3 (14:12):
Is that the Moscus wants to have this this new
regime or the new government in the Muscus. They want
to have this very centralized system, so they don't want
the Drews to run their own armed groups and they
have their own sort of local autonomy, so they have
They have been fighting before between the Drews and the
new authorities in Syria in areas near Theamascus, but there
(14:35):
was like a ceasefire and the fighting stopped. But recently
there's also like historical tensions between these Arab Bedouin tribes
and the Drews in the area.
Speaker 2 (14:44):
So these areas are quite mixed. So there's actually this
this recent conflict.
Speaker 3 (14:49):
They started when Biduan tribes they they robbed like a
merchant who was a Druce and then after that they
were like mutual kidnapping like tensions between both. And then
basically although the Moscus said they were neutral, the Mascus
started to support these Bedouin groups against the Drus and
started marching on on Sueda, which is the the Drew
(15:10):
stronghold on the border.
Speaker 2 (15:13):
And so actually there have been like.
Speaker 3 (15:15):
A few days, not even a few days, but have
been like a short period of fighting now. And actually Damascus,
they they entered this druze town of Sueda and they
actually said, okay, we control the town now, and now
we're going to withdraw the Serian army and then the
internal security force is going to control the city. That
very shortly after Israel started bombing heavily the cern armed
(15:41):
forces of the new Sirn government and then the Drews
armed groups they sort of pushed back and they pushed
out this internal security force out of the city. And
now the Drews are, according to many reports, back in
control of the city of Zuida. And now you see
that just like what happened with the Alla Whites when
there was this Asad regime remnants that they had uprising
(16:04):
against the new authorities. And then they were like these rebels.
They were mobilized with mosks all over Syria and they
went to the coast areas and they defeated those Asad
regime remnants, but they killed also a lot of civilians
some reports over fifteen hundred people. So what you now
see is that the Damascus is against mobilizing those people with.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
Mosques to march on Zueda.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
But the difference is with the other whites is that
Israel also has Drews, so there's also pressure on the
Israeli government to support the drew So it's not only
because of their strategic interests, it's also because there are
Drews living in Israel itself that also have joined the
Israeli army, so they're also pushing Israel for taking action.
(16:47):
So you saw that today, like Israel, they took a
lot of they carried out a lot of air strikes,
and the Drews that are basically back in control of
most of the Sueda city, not of the whole area.
But the fight is not all real yet. And then
you also have different rustractions. Some of them they have
better relations with Damascus, the majority of them don't. So
(17:07):
now we're going to see if there's going to be fighting,
if the fighting is going to increase again. We've seen
our reports as of that the HDS or the the
Moscus government forces that are using drones strikes by themselves
on RUS forces, so they're using basically the drones that
they used to overthrow the us UT regime.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
Okay, so yeah, that's the situation.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
Yeah, I think the world stopped looking at Syria. I mean,
I guess the world stop looking at Syria a while ago,
like really, after the defeat of the Territorial Calipate. It's
been much harder to sell stories in big newspapers in
the United States. But yeah, it's by no means, like
the fighting is not over and it leaves their SDF
(17:48):
Western Kurdistan branch of this Kurdish movement right, like in
as you said, a fairly perilous condition. Right, the Damascus
wants to centralize. I think they want to They don't
want to have independent they don't want to have like
federated autonomy. The United States seems to be, at least
(18:09):
the United States envoy to Damascus seems to be making
statements that suggests that, like the only way forward is
through centralization. On one hand, we have the PKK alene
(18:29):
Gan arm. The other hand, we have the SDF in
its difficult position. Where does this leave, like the Kurdish
Freedom Movement. I think this has been the thing that
a lot of people all over the world have looked
up to. Right, people have especially rich Ava as this
example that people could build something, a place where freedom
could exist in the middle of this terrible war in Syria.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
Do you think the movement's like in danger now?
Speaker 3 (18:51):
Well, I mean you have this new government in Syria. Actually,
and in initially to Trump administration was quite reluctant to
have relations with the new authorities in Damascus because they
were I mean, Joolani used to be on a Amachada,
used to be on a terrorist sanctioned list.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
Yeah, there was a bounty for him at one point,
it wasn't there.
Speaker 3 (19:12):
Yeah, But I think there was like a very intensive
love being by some Gulf states and Turkey to basically
remove the sanctions on not a shot at Jolani, but
also remove sanctions on Syria that the economic sanctions that
were actually were on the Asaturgy. So I think the
Trump administration changed their position, and also a new ambassador
for Syria and Turkey was appointed, so he was not
(19:34):
only the bassador Turkey but also for Syria, and he's
basically echoing a lot of the points of the new
authorities in Damascus that they was talking about one state,
one army, one days, one days, and the SEF should
be integrated and blah blah blah.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
So there was there.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
Was also recently there were talks between Theamascus and the
STF because in March they reached an agreement with Western
support and they were trying to basically make them or
finalized agreement in recently a few days ago, they had
these talks in Damascus and the French were there, and
the Brits were there, and Americans were there. But this
agreement was not implemented, it didn't lead to anything, so
(20:14):
it was not really it didn't really work very well
because the Moscus is insisting on this centralized state. And
I was just listening to Kurdish sharing Kurdish official and
she was also saying like, we don't want to separate
from Syria, but we want to have some form of
local councils and a decentralized Syria and not like a
centralized Syria. And she was also talking about what happened
(20:35):
to the Jews, that it's not a very good example
for the future of Syria. Yeah, so I think definitely
what you're saying that there is a sort of a
threat because in the past he was very supportive of
the SDF in the fight against Isis, although they didn't
support so much their political project, but they supported them
because they fought Isis. And also they were keeping out
(20:57):
Iranian backed malicious from areas like the resor. But now
you don't have me run anymore. In Syria, they were
completely kicked out after the fall of the Acet regime.
All these militias they have been disbanded or hiding or
some of them actually now being used by the Muscus.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
Against the Druze.
Speaker 3 (21:12):
So doubt that argument is not there anymore that you okay,
we have the SDF, they keep out the I ran
from the oil fields. Yeah, you could still argue you
have still have the fight against ICES, I mean ICES.
Speaker 2 (21:23):
Is still fred.
Speaker 3 (21:24):
Yeah, but the Curts don't have that same leverage anymore
as is in the past that they said, okay, we're
the main ones fighting ISS, we keep out the run
from these areas because now you have THEMSCUS. The Moscus said,
why the kurt should do that, Like, let's us take
over those prisons and the camps where you have these
thousands of Isis families and ICES prisoners, and we don't
(21:45):
need the Curds to run the ICES. Well, we can
do that for you. So I think that's now, Like
the big issue is that the US seems to be
more supporting the Moscus at these diplomatically than the SDF,
although military speaking, the support is still going on for
the SDF until twenty twenty six in the last Entergon
(22:06):
budget which was not accepted yet they're still like millions
of support for the SDF to to maintain the prisons
and this.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
Kind of stuff. So I think it's it's it's a.
Speaker 1 (22:16):
Difficult situation, yeah, that these prisons like our whole and others, right,
like they there, I guess kind of the only leverage
the FDF has with the United States where they along
with the continuing and somewhat increasing ISIS attacks, but that's
still much less of a threat to the US than
(22:37):
it was ten years ago, say, right, Like, it's it's
much less of a significant thing. So, like what is
the status of those prisons that currently they're still guided
by the SDF, right, but the people aren't familiar. Can
you just explain what those prisons consist of and like
who's in there and who's guiding them?
Speaker 3 (22:56):
Well, so IS has credit this jihadi state between twenty
fourteen and twenty nineteen, but then the Kurdish led SDF.
They basically took most of these areas under ISIS control.
They defeated basically ISIS with the support of the US,
so they lost the territory. And the last battle basically
was for a small town called Bajus and the Rezor.
(23:18):
So you had all these ISIS families there, and also
there were like several ISIS foreign members that were captured,
so you have the wives of ISIS fighters and you
also have IIS fighters themselves that were captured during these battles.
So all these people they were brought to camps. So
I was there in Syria many times. For instance, during
the battle for Raka, which was used to be the
(23:40):
capital of the ISIS Caliphate, they were like bringing the
ISIS families and women to a camp in I know Lisa.
But after that they moved most of those people to
actually move almost all of them to the Roche camp
and all hold camp in northern Syria in the Hassaka province.
Speaker 2 (23:56):
And also that includes foreigners.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
You can imagine people from Uzbek Kistan, from Uihus from China,
people from Turkey, French people, European people, so it's full
of a lot of different people, and then the majority
are actually Iraqis and Syrians, so the sea they have
this foul they a majority. Like a lot of people
(24:20):
in those camps, they have been repatriated or they have
to return to their homes. So I think those camps
like a whole camp, like the prison. It's not a prison,
it's the camp. I think like the number of people
that are basically decreased almost fifty percent, but there are
still a lot of people inside. But the prisons you
have still all these Isis spiders that were in prison
during the war, and a lot of them are foreigners,
(24:42):
including Dutch another country. You know, some countries they have
returned there, they have returned their people there. So we
have some people, you know, America they took back most
of the families and the fighters and they prosecute them
in the US. But you also have countries that didn't
bring back the fighters, for instance, only brought back the woman.
So that's the situation that all those people are still there.
(25:05):
And it's actually what you mentioned that it's like one
of the big reasons for support for the SDF, and
it's also one of the reasons that the SDF is
getting millions to keep those prisons in good shape because
they have been also attims by isis to free those
prisoners from those prisons.
Speaker 1 (25:20):
Basically, yeah, in successful attempts in twenty twenty, twenty twenty two,
I think it was when they had the last like
major prison escape, which, yeah, it's a bad thing for
our world if if all those all those people get out,
and like you say, lots of European nations, I think
it's something that I wish Americans had paid more attention to,
(25:43):
because I think that European nations have done the United
Kingdom being a paramount example, is like rendered some of
those people stateless, right that they've removed in this case,
Shmima Bagoom is probably the most well known example. Right,
they've removed her British passport and now she doesn't have
a state. She's stateless. It's something that the US has
(26:04):
recently done to people living in the United States, and
like it does feel something as if you know that
the president has been established and now it's being carried out,
and it's obviously deeply concerning to see it happening here
after like it happened there that wish people had opposed
it when it did.
Speaker 3 (26:24):
Well I mean the US, in the US itself in
Syria was very a big advocate of bringing the people out, Yes,
it was, Yeah, because it will make it easier for.
Speaker 2 (26:33):
Them to withdraw.
Speaker 3 (26:34):
So they were actually pushing those countries that didn't want
to bring back there are nationals to basically bring them back,
like Western countries, the UK and others. Yeah, but some
of these countries were actually forced by court orders or others.
But a lot of these counties were actually quite reluctant
to bring them back because they're afraid of like security
risk and stuff, or that they will be released quite
quickly and then they would again like be active and
(26:58):
jihadist activity.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
Yeah. Yeah, so US was very so.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
I remember that the US was even offering like members
of this Coalition against ISIS which was created in twenty fourteen.
Like she said, if you cannot bring them yourself, I
mean we can, our military can help you to bring
those people out. If you think that you it's it's
difficult for you to go to Syria and pick those
nationals up from your accounts.
Speaker 1 (27:21):
Yeah, yeah, been pretty unsuccessful, like in a lot of
well in some European cases they have, but still, yeah,
lots of them utterly refusing to do it. I wonder
then as we finish up here, right, like we spoke
about this PKK disarmament, obviously it's a symbolic disarmament, right
there is still I don't quite know how big the
hPG is, but it's much bigger than thirty people. And
(27:43):
then the weapons they laid down were like a very
small percentage of their weapons. Were they just burning like kalashnikov?
So did they burn like larger weapons too.
Speaker 3 (27:54):
No, it was just their personal collagicals basically. Okay, yeah,
I mean it was also like more symbol like symbolic ceremony,
like we are willing to give up. But the thing
is that also it's still not clear what happened to
those thirty people.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
Are they going to go back to Turkey, That's what
I wanted to ask, Yeah, are.
Speaker 3 (28:11):
They going to stay in Iraqi Curdistan and find a
job there? Because you have people like that in Iraqi
Kurdistan that used to be with the pigger k and
that now they work in I don't know, in media
or construction sector or entertainment sector. You have people like that,
But there's not much clarity on that. But I think
also that's because they're waiting on Turkey to make possible
(28:32):
constitutional steps, you know, to see what Turkey is going
to do, because for instance, Turkey could offer an amnesty
or the kind of things, then those people could return.
And also some of them were saying like now it's
the end of weapons, but we still want to be
involved in.
Speaker 2 (28:45):
Politics, right through the political party.
Speaker 3 (28:47):
So it's also possible that those people want to go
back to Turkey and basically take part in Kurdish politics
or Turkish politics to be more corrected in Turkey. So
I think it's a little bit too early to say
what happened with those people, because I remember also if
I very much corrected, they're also having peace process that
basically people have given basically went to the border and
(29:07):
give themselves up to Turkey. But that didn't happen now,
so it's a bit different than in the past. Yeah,
but it seems that the Turkish government was very happy
with the ceremony. They didn't complain about it.
Speaker 1 (29:18):
So okay, yeah, yeah, I wondered what happened. So those
guerrillas or former guerrillas I suppose, who laid down their
weapons at the end of the ceremony, they just kind
of returned to the mountains or whatever.
Speaker 2 (29:30):
We don't know what will happen with them now.
Speaker 3 (29:32):
That's that's not clear to me because there are still
some unanswered questions like what you mentioned now, like what
those thirty people did, Yeah, what those people are going
to do now?
Speaker 1 (29:42):
So right, there's a lot of people, and it's a
lot of people, some of whom have spent decades as
cadra of the revolution, right they have they haven't really
known life outside of the revolution for a very long time.
Speaker 3 (29:56):
Yeah, so it's so a bit difficult for them to
return to civilian life because I mean because they probably
joined when they're quite young, and I think I was
also the profiles of the people of the thirty people
will burn their weapons that a lot of them they
joined in the nineties. Wow, so they have been in
they have been in the mountains for a very long time. Yeah,
I mean some of them were young, but there were
(30:17):
also older people among them. But definitely it's going to
be a question what will happen with those people, although
I mean they were also talked that some leadership of
the armed Pikak movement might go to Europe and get
asylum there.
Speaker 2 (30:31):
Yeah, Instead of going back to Turkey.
Speaker 3 (30:33):
Yeah, you know, you have also a lot of courage
the asport or organizations active there, so they could like
basically embrace those people.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
Yeah, but they're still listed as a foreign terrorist organization
in most two Yeah exactly.
Speaker 3 (30:46):
I mean, for instance, they probably would want to have
something like what the Syrian president have now Ahmatoshada that
he used to be listed as a sanctioned as a
terrorist organization and then to have that removed. But I'm
sure that that's not on the table anytime soon.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
But that happened with the HTS.
Speaker 3 (31:02):
But also it t happened for instance much Hulk and
Uranian opposition group they also got delisted. So it's technically
as possible. But I think we are like in a
very early stage of the peace process. So that's why
I think it's going to take time before we have
more clarity and some of these answers that questions you ask, now,
I mean most of the people that attended the ceremony
(31:22):
didn't have an answer to that too, because there was
not much clarity on that because it was just a ceremony.
There was like a statement. Journals were not able to
talk to most of the journalists. I mean there was
like some statement in some Kurdish media, but in general,
like they were not able to talk to those fighters,
like now, what are you going to do? There was
not like access to those thirty people that burned their weapons,
(31:44):
so it was like sort of quite very much controlled ceremony.
It was very difficult to report on it basically, which
is very different from the previous peace process when it
was much more open. But that time there was not
like forty fighters giving up their weapons. They just had
like sort of a press conference, is what we I'm
gonna do? And that was very different than what happened now.
Speaker 1 (32:04):
Yeah, yeah, it gets it's a big just to keep watching.
It's fascinating to watch it unfold. Like I was in
Curdish Down a year and a half ago, and it
is competed, it's seen. The situation is completely different likewise
in the whole of Syria. So yeah, it's fascinating to watch.
I'm sure if people want to know more about it.
You're very good at reporting on this. You often post
(32:26):
on Twitter about the situation, and you write for a
number of outlets. So how can people follow your work?
Speaker 3 (32:32):
Well, the best place to follow my workers on Twitter
on x X because I'm quite active there, but also
I write for places like Middle East I something thanks
like watching the Institute New a Liance Institute. I also
write for a Kurdish magazine called Kurtist thank Chronicle, and
also I pitched for other websites, so I'm quite active
(32:55):
on different issues, but mostly focused on things related to Kurts,
mostly stuff related to Iran, Turkey, Siria.
Speaker 2 (33:03):
It's inter Yeah, well, thank you so much for joining us.
We really appreciate your insight. You're welcome, my friend. It
Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media.
Speaker 3 (33:14):
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
coolzonmedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Speaker 2 (33:25):
You can now find sources for It Could Happen Here.
Listened directly in episode descriptions.
Speaker 1 (33:29):
Thanks for listening.
It Could Happen Here News
Hosts And Creators
Robert Evans
Garrison Davis
James Stout
Show Links
AboutPopular Podcasts
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.