Accused in the United States and internationally for offering Turkey a green light to attack Washington's Kurdish allies in Syria, President Donald Trump was pleased to have obtained an agreement Thursday, October 17, an agreement of "cease-fire" synonymous with "great day for civilization".

An agreement announced by US Vice President Mike Pence following a meeting in Ankara with Recep Tayyip Erdogan, which is mostly perceived as an American capitulation to the demands of the Turkish president, at the expense of Syrian Kurds.

This is a great day for civilization. I am proud of the United States of America, but somewhat unconventional, path. People have been trying to make this "Deal" for many years. Millions of lives will be saved. Congratulations to ALL!

Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 17, 2019

"The US president has announced he has saved millions of lives, but the reality is much more complex, it is a minimum agreement that excludes the Kurds, it is a bipartisan text US-Turkish that takes a previous agreement between Washington and Ankara concluded before the Turkish offensive, which already included a demilitarized zone at the border, "Julien Théron, a professor of conflict and international security at Sciences-Po, told France 24.

Specifically, Turkey, which has challenged the qualification of "cease-fire", which does not appear in the joint declaration US-Turkish, undertook to suspend for five days its offensive launched on October 9 in the north of Syria. And this, in order to allow the Kurdish forces to withdraw, a "security zone" of a depth of 32 km along the Turkish border.

Ankara, which according to the text will terminate its operation if this withdrawal is real at the end of the period, did not immediately specify the length of this sector. In the past, the Turks had threatened to push their offensive about 480 km to the border with Iraq.

Abandon the conquered cities and lay down their arms

In addition, the text of the agreement issued by the Turkish Presidency provides, "in order to address Turkey's national security concerns, the recovery of YPG heavy weapons and the destruction of their fortifications and all their other positions. fighting in the area ".

The "security zone" was an old demand from Turkey, which calls the YPG "terrorist" and fears that an embryonic Kurdish state on its borders will fuel separatist aspirations in its country. A Turkish official told Reuters that his country had obtained "exactly what we wanted" from these talks with the Americans.

"The United States has just ratified Turkey's plan to push back its 30-kilometer border inside Syria, without being able to significantly influence the events on the ground", summed up, very criticism, the former US emissary for the fight against jihadist Brett McGurk, who resigned in December when President Trump began the US military withdrawal.

In exchange, the Turks have promised the Americans that this "safe zone" would be temporary and would not cause massive population displacements, said Thursday evening the US Special Representative for Syria, James Jeffrey, aboard the plane of the US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

According to Mike Pence, Ankara also pledged not to conduct a military operation in the city of Kobane, where Kurdish fighters of the People's Protection Units (YPG) had dislodged the IS in 2015 at the end of a highly symbolic battle.

"Clauses that Kurds have very little chance of accepting"

For their part, the Kurds of Syria, kept out of the negotiations, seem to be the big losers of this agreement which thwarts their autonomist dreams in the Rojava territory, in which they had set up their own public institutions. Back to the wall, they even turned to the Syrian regime which deployed its troops in areas of the north of the country at the call of the authorities of the Kurdish minority.

It remains to be seen whether the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a Kurdish-dominated movement that, with the support of the Americans, is at the forefront of the fight against the jihadists of the Islamic State Organization (IEO), will fully comply with this agreement.

Without referring to the text, the commander of the SDF, Mazloum Abdi, told the Kurdish media Ronahi TV that the group would accept the ceasefire with Turkey in northern Syria. He added that it was limited to the border areas separating the cities of Ras al-Ain and Tal Abyad, adding that the fate of the other Kurdish-controlled areas was not discussed.

"The Kurds are not signatories to the agreement, and this is where the rub is that it is among other things the abandonment of YPG's hard-won cities to the jihadists, and also asking the militia Kurds to lay down their arms before withdrawing from the desired buffer zone by Ankara, explains Mathieu Mabin, France 24 correspondent in Washington.The abandonment of cities and disarmament are two clauses that the Kurds have very little chance of accepting. and these are two specific points that directly threaten the ceasefire. "