Turkey to warn Syria Kurds against attempts for autonomy

Iran Press TV

Fri Jul 26, 2013 3:27PM GMT

Turkey says its intelligence agency will warn the head of Kurdish fighters of Syria's Democratic Union Party (PYD) against any unilateral move to establish an autonomous Kurdish political structure in northern Syria.

'Necessary warnings will be made to them that these steps they are taking are wrong and dangerous,' Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan told reporters on Friday.

Erdogan made the remarks as PYD leader Saleh Muslim Muhammad met with Turkey's National Intelligence Organization officials in Istanbul.

Muhammad arrived in Turkey on an 'unexpected' visit late on Thursday for two days of talks, Turkish media said.

PYD fighters have recently seized control of areas in northern Syria, near the Turkish border, raising concerns in Ankara that the Kurds might seek to create a 'de facto' Syrian Kurdish entity on its frontiers.

On July 20, Qatar-based Al Jazeera news network quoted the PYD leader as saying that Syria's Kurds were planning to create a "temporary autonomous government to administer their regions in the north."

China's Xinhua news agency quoted Muhammad one day later as denying any plans to form an autonomous Kurdish government or to secede from Syria.

Syrian Kurds, who have been granted a certain level of autonomy since 2012, are opposed to foreign interference in Syria and have been battling foreign-backed militants in the north in recent months.

The unrest in Syria erupted in March 2011. According to the UN, more than 100,000 people have been killed in the country since the outbreak of the turmoil.

MRS/KA