US FM candidate's views on PKK and Syrian Kurds

Anthony Blinken has said the United States should continue to be present in Kurdish-controlled regions of Syria, but that it should do more to help Turkey oust the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) leaders in Qandil Mountains.

According to some American media outlets, such as Bloomberg, the election of Anthony Blinken by US President-elect Joe Biden as Secretary of State has been confirmed.

One of the issues that the US State Department has always been involved with has been the Kurdish issue and its interaction with Turkey on this issue.

Anthony Blinken, the possible new US Secretary of State, has made many statements about the Kurds over the past three years, especially the Syrian Kurdish forces and the PKK in Turkey.

In an interview with CBS America last year, Blinken described the withdrawal of US troops from northern Syria and leaving Syrian Kurdish forces alone in the face of Turkish aggression as a dangerous mistake. He stressed that the move which led into the displacement of a large number of Kurds was an irreparable loss that he could not forget.

He also called on the Trump administration to arm Syrian Kurdish forces in the attack, in an article published in the Washington Times in 2017 before the Syrian Kurdish forces launched an operation in Raqqa, the center of the ISIS caliphate. However, he called on Trump to arm the Kurds only to fight ISIS, and stressed that this should not lead to the PKK gaining access to the weapons provided by the United States to Kurdish forces in Syria.

He suggested that in addition to US support for the Syrian Kurds, the country should double its support for Turkey against the PKK and help Ankara eliminate PKK leaders in the Qandil Mountains in the Kurdish region.

In the interview with CBS, he stressed that US forces should continue to support the Syrian Kurds and be present in Kurdish-controlled areas, but that, contrary to Donald Trump's wishes, US forces should not dominate Syrian oil fields.

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