Syrian war likely to ‘drag into next decade’

BEIRUT: A Russian-led effort to end the war in Syria will fail and the conflict looks set to extend into the next decade, a Syrian Kurdish politician said.

Aldar Khalil, an architect of Kurdish-led plans for autonomous rule in northern Syria, also said the US appears in “no hurry” to leave areas where it has helped Kurdish-led forces fight Islamic State, and that he expects ties with Washington to develop as US recovery efforts proceed.

The Syrian Kurds are among the few winners in the almost seven-year-old war, having established control over large parts of the north with a powerful militia that has partnered with the US-led coalition against IS.

Russia, President Bashar al-Assad’s ally, has asked them to take part in an international peace conference on Syria for the first time – a peace congress scheduled in the Russian city of Sochi on January 29-30.

“We are invited and we might take part but it will not succeed,” Khalil, co-chair of the Movement for a Democratic Society, a coalition of Syrian Kurdish parties, said.

He questioned what the hundreds of attendees could accomplish in two days and said more preparation was required.

UN-led diplomacy in Geneva was also set for more failure, he said, adding that the war would “ebb and flow” until at least 2021, the end of Assad’s seven-year presidential term.

“I don’t expect any breakthrough in the Syrian situation before 2021... it might even go on until ‘25,” he said. – Reuters