Kurdish-led administration in Syria sets election dates — official

Members of The Syrian Democratic Forces, and of the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG), the armed wing of the Kurdish Democratic Party (PYD), move through destroyed buildings in Raqa on July 28, 2017. Syrian government troops entered the last Daesh group stronghold in the country's Homs province on July 28 after jihadists began withdrawing, a monitor said. The Syrian Democratic Forces have been fighting for several months to capture the northern city, which has become infamous as the Syrian heart of Daesh's so-called "caliphate." (AFP)

BEIRUT: The Kurdish-led administration in northern Syria will hold elections for local councils and a regional assembly in September, November and January, a Kurdish official said on Saturday on a social networking feed.
Kurdish groups and their allies control swathes of northern Syria in areas held by the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), an alliance of militias spearheaded by the Kurdish YPG.
But formal self-government by the Kurds there alarms Turkey, which regards the YPG and the dominant Syrian Kurdish political party as extensions of the Kurdistan Workers Party or PKK which has waged a three-decade insurgency against Ankara.
Elections will be held in late summer for bodies running local communities, in November for bodies running larger areas and next January for the region as a whole, the Kurdish official said via a social networking feed.
The dates and rules for conducting the vote were agreed by a council set up in December to form governing institutions and prepare for elections.
The dominant Kurdish groups in northern Syria have carved out self-governing regions since early in the civil war, but they say they are not seeking independence from Damascus.
Syrian President Bashar Assad has tolerated Kurdish control over parts of the country but says he opposes the decentralized federal system they espouse and has described their ruling councils as “temporary structures.”