PYD: Kurdish Leader Rejects Interim Government for Syria

26/08/2012 By NEHRO MUHAMMAD – RUDAW – ERBIL, Kurdistan Region—An official from Syria’s most influential Kurdish party expresses his opposition to the creation of an interim government for the country. Mahmoud Mohammed, known as Abu Sabir, a senior official from the Democratic Union Party (PYD) told Rudaw “it is not the time to form an interim government. It is time to unify all Syrian opposition groups to bring down (President Bashar) al-Assad’s regime and not create an interim government.”

The PYD claims to have “liberated” those areas, but it is believed the PYD was handed control of the Kurdish areas based on an agreement with the regime in Damascus. During a recent meeting with French President Francois Holland, the head of the Syrian National Council (SNC), an umbrella opposition group, spoke of “intensive talks with all the components of Syria to form an interim government.”

SNC’s leader Abdulbaset Sieda, who is an ethnic Kurd, added “we work seriously to announce as soon as possible that government which will include all the components of Syria.” But PYD’s Mohammed says, “The formation of an interim government will only add to the differences and will not resolve the situation.”

The PYD is perceived as a branch of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) that has been fighting the Turkish state for Kurdish rights for nearly three decades.

http://www.rudaw.net/english/kurds/5131.html