Negotiations have collapsed between the Syrian president and the chief of the country’s Kurdish-led forces, a Kurdish official told AFP, as the army deployed reinforcements to flashpoint areas in the north. President Ahmed al-Sharaa and Mazloum Abdi, who heads the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), were meeting to discuss a ceasefire agreement that included integrating the Kurds’ administration into the state. In the phone call, they “emphasized the need to guarantee the Kurdish people’s rights and protection within the framework of the Syrian state,” the Syrian presidency said. Under the agreement, Damascus also took responsibility for IS prisoners and their families held in Kurdish-run jails and camps. Local fighters from tribes in the Arab-majority Deir Ezzor province sided with Damascus and seized the areas before the arrival of government forces.
