Jan 22 (Reuters) – Syrian Kurdish forces have lost control of big parts of the country this month as government troops under President Ahmed al-Sharaa seek to bring their security forces and territory under the authority of the central state.
The losses are the latest setback for the Kurds, an ethnic group that was left stateless a century ago when the borders of the modern Middle East emerged from the collapsing Ottoman Empire.
HISTORY
Kurdish nationalism stirred in the 1890s when the Ottoman Empire was on its last legs. The 1920 Treaty of Sevres, which imposed a colonial carve-up of Turkey after World War One, promised them independence.
Three years later, Turkish leader Mustafa Kemal Ataturk rendered that accord obsolete by winning the Turkish War of Independence. The Treaty of Lausanne, ratified in 1924, divided the Kurds among the new nations of the Middle East.
They speak a language related to Farsi and are concentrated in a mountainous region straddling the borders of Armenia, Iraq, Iran, Syria and Turkey. Kurds are mostly Sunni Muslims.
SYRIA
Kurds form about 10% of the Syrian population.
Under deposed President Bashar al-Assad, the Baathist state deprived thousands of them citizenship rights, banned their language and clamped down on Kurdish political activity.
As Syria descended into civil war in 2011, with Assad focused on trying to crush Sunni Arab rebels in western Syria, the Syrian Kurdish PYD group and an affiliated militia, the YPG, established self-rule in Kurdish-majority areas of the north.
The area under Kurdish control expanded as the YPG, under the umbrella of the Syrian Democratic Forces, partnered with the United States in the campaign against Islamic State.
Following Assad’s ouster by Islamist rebels led by Sharaa in 2024, the Kurdish groups have aimed to preserve their autonomy, concerned that the new rulers in Damascus aim to dominate the new order.
But their hand has been weakened as Washington has built close ties to Sharaa, echoing his calls for the Kurds to integrate with Damascus.
Sharaa, who has vowed to protect the rights of all Syrian groups, issued a decree on January 16 formally recognizing Kurdish as a national language alongside Arabic, and permitting it to be taught in schools, among other steps.
Since then, government advances have forced the SDF to retreat to Kurdish-majority areas.
The PYD is heavily influenced by the ideology of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), long active in neighbouring Turkey.
TURKEY
Kurds form about 20% of the population of Turkey, mainly living in the southeast.
The PKK took up arms against the state in 1984, waging an insurgency, initially seeking a separate state but later moderating its goal to autonomy and greater rights for Kurds.
More than 40,000 people have been killed in the conflict.
Turkey has held PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan in prison since capturing him in 1999.
In early 2025, Turkey launched a peace process with the PKK, and Ocalan called on the PKK to lay down arms. The process has, however, somewhat stalled since then.
President Tayyip Erdogan removed restrictions on using the Kurdish language during the 2000s and early 2010s.
The United States, the European Union and Turkey classify the PKK as a terrorist organization.
Turkey’s military has often struck targets in Iraq’s Kurdish region near the PKK’s stronghold in the Qandil mountains.
Turkey has also sent troops into northern Syria several times to counter the YPG, which Ankara deems an extension of the PKK.
Turkish officials have said recent events in Syria could kick-start the peace process in Turkey.
IRAQ
Kurds form 15-20% of the population, mainly inhabiting three mountainous northern provinces that make up Iraqi Kurdistan.
In the late 1980s, Iraq’s authoritarian ruler Saddam Hussein targeted Iraqi Kurds with chemical gas, razed Kurdish villages and forced thousands of Kurds into camps.
After Saddam’s forces were driven out of the north in the first Gulf War in 1991, Kurdish political parties gained control of Iraqi Kurdistan.
Since the U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam in 2003, Iraq’s central government has recognised autonomy for Kurdistan, which is led by a regional government with a budget apportioned from Baghdad under a formula for dividing oil income.
When Islamic State militants swept through much of northern Iraq in 2014, Kurdish fighters exploited the collapse of central authority to expand their territory, including taking control of Kirkuk, an oil city they view as their ancient capital.
In September 2017, Iraq’s Kurds held a referendum on independence, which backfired, eliciting fierce opposition from Baghdad and regional powers. The vote prompted military and economic retaliation from Baghdad, which retook Kirkuk and other disputed areas. Ties between the centre and the Kurdish regional government have since improved, though tensions remain over oil exports and revenue-sharing.
IRAN
Kurds form about 10% of the population.
Rights groups say Kurds, along with other religious and ethnic minorities, face discrimination under the ruling clerical establishment. The Islamic Republic denies persecuting Kurds.
There are three main Iranian Kurdish separatist factions, all based in Iraqi Kurdistan. Iran has demanded authorities in Iraq hand over separatist Kurdish dissidents stationed there and close their bases.
Iran’s Kurdish regions have been a focal point of unrest following anti-government protests that began in late December 2025 and led to thousands of people being killed in January 2026. During the unrest Reuters reported that armed Kurdish separatist groups had sought to cross the border into Iran from Iraq.
Kurdish areas were also a major flashpoint during the previous major wave of domestic unrest in 2022, when nationwide protests were triggered by the death in custody of an Iranian-Kurdish woman.
(Editing by Tom Perry and Peter Graff)
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