SULAIMANI (ESTA) — Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) Prime Minister Masrour Barzani has asked the United States to deploy observers to the border between the Region and Syria, al-Monitor reported on Tuesday.
Pompeo spoke by phone with Barzani on Tuesday, according to the U.S. State Department and the KRG.
They discussed regional security challenges, de-escalation at the border between the Kurdistan and Syria, and the need for continued, close cooperation between Coalition forces, United States, Baghdad and Erbil, the state department said.
Al-Monitor cited Kurdish officials as saying that Barzani had formally asked the United States during the phone call with Pompeo to deploy U.S.-led Coalition observers to patrol the border between the Kurdistan Region and the Kurdish-controlled northeast of Syria.
KRG premier’s deputy chief of staff Aziz Ahmad told al-Monitor that the patrols would serve several purposes, including “independently verifying any smuggling operations along the border, which would be good for the KRG and its main regional ally, Turkey”.
The observers would “discourage the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party from moving men and supplies from its bases in northern Iraq to Syrian Kurdistan, or Rojava, and that would be good for everyone,” al-Monitor cited the official as saying.
The premier’s request came after clashes erupted between Peshmerga forces and the People’s Protection Units (YPG) near Sihela on the border between the Kurdistan Region and Syria on December 16.
Deputy Minister of Peshmerga forces Sarbast Lazgin said a YPG unit including 50-60 fighters attacked a Peshmerga point near Sihela on the border between the Kurdistan Region and Syria the same day.
Al-Monitor cited Ahmad as saying that the U.S. presence as “honest brokers” would hold the PKK-mentored and YPG accountable to “serving ties with the PKK”.
On Monday, the KRG premier also asked for the deployment of Coalition troops during a meeting with the commanding general of the Special Operations Joint Task-Force-Operation Inherent Resolve, Brig. Gen. Guillaume Beaurpere, according to al-Monitor.
