Syria plans to grant citizenship to 300,000 Kurds living in the country, a Kurdish representative revealed to the London based A-Sharq Al-Awsat.
Shakib Hajou, a representative of the Kurdish Haderkan tribe from the Al-Hasakah district, said a 43-member delegation representing all the Kurdish tribes in Syria, met recently with Ba’ath Party official Muhammad Sa’id Bakhtian, and two other regional politicians in Damascus.
They discussed restoring citizenship to Kurds at the earliest possible opportunity.
Bakhtian said an order will be issued within the next month granting citizenship to about 300,000 Kurds, Hajou said, adding that it was unclear whether they will be granted gradually or at one time.
The citizenship idea was mentioned by the Syrian government last year as part of a “comprehensive plan” to develop the Syrian-Iraqi-Turkish border region.
The Media Line’s analysts say a gesture of this kind from Damascus toward its Kurdish residents could be a way to appease the international community which has often criticized Syria over its treatment of Kurds. Syria is currently under heavy international pressure regarding the assassination of former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Al-Hariri in February 2005. The international commission probing the killing has implicated senior Syrians in the incident.
Kurds are a non-Arab ethnic group numbering between 25 and 30 million people, although some put it to closer to 40 million. They inhabit a mountainous region known as Kurdistan, spanning northwest Iran, northeast Iraq, east Turkey, northeast Syria and a small community in Armenia.
The Kurds constitute a minority in all these countries and have been oppressed, to varying degrees, in all areas.
In 2004 a riot during a football game in the Syrian town Qamishli sparked protests by Kurds across the country. Dozens were killed by Syrian security forces, and riots soon spread to neighboring districts.
Syrian Kurds number less than one million people and constitute between 8 and 10 percent of the Syrian population.
Kurds who have been in Syria since the state was formed are fully recognized citizens. Over the years, many Kurds infiltrated the country to flee persecution in Iraq and Turkey. These Kurds are not registered as citizens, and are called ‘maktoumin,’ or ‘hidden ones.’ They are denied Syrian citizenship, cannot vote or own property and are denied passports or internationally recognized travel documents.