“Civil Society Spotlight” is a series aiming at highlighting and contextualising the voices of Syrian civil society organizations, activists, journalists, and people who advocate for positive solutions, human rights, democratic values, and social justice.
The context
On the morning of 26 March, around 450 Kurdish politicians flocked to Azadi Park, west of the city of Qamishli in northeastern Syria, to join the Kurdish Unity Conference. The historic event was attended by representatives from the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK-Iraq), a delegation from the Kurdish Peoples' Equality and Democracy Party (DEM-Turkey). Representatives from the US State Department and the international coalition also attended, making the event even more relevant.
The conference produced a political document called the ‘Joint Kurdish Political Vision’, but it was not officially published. Social media and local media platforms circulated two non-identical versions of the document (see 1 and 2). In both of them, the most prominent element was the demand to “unify the Kurdish regions as an integrated political and administrative unit within the framework of a federal Syria”.
In the streets of Qamishli and other cities in the northeast, thousands of Kurdish citizens celebrated in the streets after the conference, expressing their joy at the possible realisation of the long-awaited “dream of Kurdish unity”.
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Indeed, for the majority of Kurds, always burdened with their nationalist concerns, unity remains the only hope to realise their rights amid the country's transformation.
At the broader national level, the story is different.
For some, the Kurdish unity conference was seen as a historic event, the culmination of decades of Kurdish struggle, paving the way for solutions also at the Syrian national level. Others, however, saw it as a theatrical spectacle that did not add anything new to the Kurdish political scene, both internally and nationally.
Whatever the reactions, the event remains a pivotal moment that revealed the divergence of perceptions about the Kurdish issue between Kurdish and non-Kurdish civil society voices in Syria.
This article covers how Syrian civil society organizations and activists interacted with the Kurdish Unity Conference. We focus on the distinction between the approaches of Kurdish and non-Kurdish civil activists, which reveals the extent of the difference between the positions of the two sides and its impact in relation to a future unified and cohesive civil society in Syria. It also pushes us to open a debate about the role that civil society should play in a still divided country.
Syrian Kurdish civil society engagement
Since the fall of the Assad regime, Kurdish civil society demands to establish an internal dialogue between the two poles of the Kurdish political conflict: the Democratic Union Party (PYD) with its autonomous administration and military forces (SDF) on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the parties of the Kurdish National Council (ENKS). In early January 2025, 38 Kurdish civil society organisations and dozens of public figures launched the Kurdish Civil Society Initiative for Kurdish Political Unity and offered to help facilitate the unification efforts. At the same time, the Zameen Development and Peacebuilding Organisation was conducting extensive meetings with various Kurdish political forces as part of the ‘Hand in Hand’ initiative, which called for Kurdish-Kurdish consensus and strengthening the role of civil society within that consensus.
This interest by Kurdish civil society activists in launching an internal political dialogue in which they could participate escalated further shortly before the conference. On 14 April, nine Kurdish organizations in the diaspora issued a supportive statement, calling the conference an important step in the process of building an independent Syrian Kurdish political discourse. The statement, at the same time, warned against “reducing the national representation (of the Kurds) to closed party frameworks, without involving civil forces”. It also added: “It is very disturbing that, until now, we in civil society have not received any draft or working paper explaining what Kurdish demands have been agreed upon between the two parties”. The statement went on to say that the Kurdish parties' demands were not clear.
Berlin-based Kurdish activist Farhad Ahmi, director of civil society organisation Civil Waves (PÊL), based in Qamishli, explains to SyriaUntold: “As civil society, we are completely out of the game. The participation of civil society in the conference was only formal and the conference was not preceded by a national dialogue.
Indeed, by searching the online platforms of dozens of civil society organisations that are active in northeast Syria, we found that only one organisation published news about the participation of its members in the conference, namely GAV for Relief and Development.
Berlin-based Kurdish activist Farhad Ahmi, director of civil society organisation Civil Waves (PÊL), based in Qamishli, explains to SyriaUntold: “As civil society, we are completely out of the game. The participation of civil society in the conference was only formal and the conference was not preceded by a national dialogue. What is even more relevant is that there are no established channels and mechanisms for communication and interaction between political forces and Kurdish civil society in Syria. Our parties present slogans and avoid providing information to the public and interacting with it”.
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Commenting on the limited participation of civil society organisations in the conference, the director of a civil society organisation active in al-Hasakah, who asked us not to be named), laughed: “The big political parties barely got a seat at the conference, let alone us civil society groups...The majority of the attendees were from parties and institutions affiliated with the Autonomous Administration, and the rest were leaders from the Kurdish National Council parties”.
A week before the event, activist Mustafa Ismail posted on his Facebook account that the Kurdish conference “is the result of an understanding between the two main Kurdish parties in Syria (pro-Barzani and pro-Ocalan) and it will end with the balance tipping in favour of Ocalan's supporters. The conference will not witness important or serious discussions, as the basic outlines and some details have already been decided in advance”.
Other reactions were more positive. “We are positive about the conference because it is an important step on the moral level for the Kurds, and it also produced a document that constitutes a necessary basis for negotiating the Kurdish issue with Damascus”, Farhad Ahmi, a Kurdish civil society leader, told SyriaUntold. Many Kurdish civil society leaders also posted their welcome for the conference and its outcomes, including Hozan Ibrahim, director of the Berlin-based organisation Impact, who posted on his Facebook account: “The agreement signed by the Kurdish parties on 26 April 2025 is an important achievement for Kurds in general and a prelude to a national Syrian political movement that will open the way for political parties and other components to define their demands and pressure for full participation in the administration of the country”.
Syrian non-Kurdish civil society engagement
Despite the strong interest in the Kurdish conference among civil society activists in northern Syria, Damascus and elsewhere, most Syrian CSOs did not issue a public position on the conference. We spotted two organisations, both of which were founded by Arab activists from the north-east of the country, that commented on the matter in public statements. The National Arab Youth Group's statement begins by recognizing the national rights of the Kurds and that they do not conflict with the country’s unity, while warning that the outcomes of the conference are pushing towards a social polarisation that can negatively affect everyone.
The statement ends by saying: “We call on the Kurdish parties to reconsider their declared proposals (as those about federalism, author’s note) that have angered Syrians, and to work in the spirit of national consensus, and to put the interest of Syria and all its components above anything else”.
The Sons of Al-Jazeera Group's, a newly established political and civil organisation, expressed a far more strident position. Their statement begins by describing the conference as “an extension of the suspicious attempts to fragment the Syrian national fabric” and ends by saying: “We call on all free Syrians to stand united in the face of any project that targets the unity of the country.”
Osama al-Hussein, a civil activist based in Idlib, explains SyriaUntold the position of organisations active in northwestern Syria, formerly opposition-held areas, towards the Kurdish conference: “What is happening in the northeast of the country for us is ambiguous. We don’t know who is negotiating and what for, but from what we receive through the media I can say that rejection is the general attitude towards the conference...
However, most of the discussions about the conference in the digital space involved individuals: civil activists, political figures, and academics.
Some voices welcomed the conference. Sam Dallah, a Syrian academic based in France, posted on Facebook: “The statement of the Kurdish National Conference includes many inclusive principles that can serve as a base to rebuild Syria as a country that accommodates all its people to live in peace and justice”.
Journalist and activist Farah Youssef also commented on the same platform: “The Kurdish unity conference is an excellent and important step. I have reservations about some of the outcomes, but I fully agree with the principles of citizenship, equality and justice adopted by the conference, as well as deciding to commit to a unified Syria rather than a multi-centralised one”.
Osama al-Hussein, a civil activist based in Idlib, explains SyriaUntold the position of organisations active in northwestern Syria, formerly opposition-held areas, towards the Kurdish conference: “What is happening in the northeast of the country for us is ambiguous. We don’t know who is negotiating and what for, but from what we receive through the media I can say that rejection is the general attitude towards the conference...Northern activists support the principle of equal citizenship and reject any additional rights or privileges that would threaten state-building efforts. Civil society in the north supports the state option, and just as they accepted HTS, they are ready to accept the SDF as a partner if they adhere to the principle of citizenship”.
The information gap about the composition and dynamics in northeast Syria seems to be an issue for public activists in the rest of Syria as well.
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“We organised a series of dialogue sessions in various Syrian governorates, including Sweida, Homs and Rural Damascus, to present and discuss the reality of our region, and we found that people are interested but do not know anything about what is happening there (in the Northeast, Author’s note). Most tend to reduce the scene to the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which reveals the weakness of our media system and its bias in favour of either the government or the SDF” told us civil activist Jalal al-Hamad, director of the Justice for Life Organization, which is mainly active in the north-east and expanded its scope of work after the regime fell.
Conclusion
In general, the conference reopened the debate on the position of the Kurdish issue in Syria, not only in terms of national rights, but also in terms of the relationship between civil society and political representation. It also raised questions about the extent to which civil society is able to play the role of a bridge between affiliations, rather than simply expressing them. The lack of transparency and constructive dialogue, along with other factors, threatens to make civil society lose its role as a neutral and constructive actor and become an additional party in the polarisation equation. Therefore, civil society is facing a real test today.
List of main CSOs and activists included in this article
