Syria Kurds urge Damascus to choose dialogue: commander
The top military commander in Syria's autonomous Kurdish region urged Damascus on Saturday to choose the path of dialogue after his forces sealed a key victory over the Islamic State group.
"We call on the central government in Damascus to prefer the process of dialogue," Mazloum Kobane, the overall commander of the Syrian Democratic Forces, said in a statement.
He read part of the statement at a ceremony to pay homage to his fallen comrades and celebrate the capture of Baghouz, the very last pocket of territory held by IS, which SDF forces took after weeks of fighting.
The statement urged the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to "start practical steps to reach a political solution based on the recognition" of autonomous institutions and of the SDF's special status.
Syria's eight-year conflict has seen the country's Kurds carve out a large de facto autonomous region in the oil-rich northeast.
The Kurdish-dominated SDF has acted as the ground force of the US-led military ..