ANKARA
Founded by jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, the PYD is the Syrian affiliate of the terrorist PKK organization.
Though Salih Muslim is described as the PYD’s chief, the group's actual leader is Fehman Huseyin, a senior PKK figure who came from the Qandil Mountains in northern Iraq and whose codename is "Bahoz Erdal".
The PYD terrorist group describes the PKK as a "supreme legislative body".
The PKK seeks to establish "Kurdistan" under the umbrella of what is called the "Group of Communities in Kurdistan" (KCK), which is comprised of the PKK, the PYD, Iraq's Kurdistan Democratic Solution Party (PCDK) and Iran's Party of Free Life of Kurdistan (PJAK).
According to security sources, Ocalan ordered the establishment of the PYD on Feb. 16, 2002.
In April of 2002, the PKK held a meeting during which the group announced the establishment of other groups in Iran, Iraq and Syria. On Oct. 17, 2003, the PYD assumed the PKK’s role in Syria.
The PYD held meetings between 2003 and 2015 in PKK-run terror camps. One of the decisions taken at these meetings was to make what is known as "Martyred Ayhan" camp in the Qandil Mountains the PYD’s main headquarters and to send PYD members trained there to Syria.
This headquarters is no longer in operation. The PYD's current headquarters is located near Azaz city in Syria's northern Aleppo province, which was captured by the terrorist group last December.
PKK/KCK executive council member Ferhat Abi Sahin, who goes by the codename "Sahin Cilo Kobani-Mazlum", was assigned head of the YPG, the armed wing of the PYD.
On Jan. 31, 2016, Sahin was seen beside Brett McGurk, the U.S. special presidential envoy for an international U.S.-led anti-Daesh coalition, during a visit by the latter to Kobani (the city of Tal Abyad).
However, authority within the PYD remains with Huseyin, who, since the second half of 2014, has been serving as Qandil Mountains' general officer in Syria, responsible for conveying strategy and policy drawn up in Qandil to PYD members.
PKK duplicate
The first head of the PYD was Barzani Muhammad, who was eventually succeeded by Salih Muslim, whose codename within the PKK is "Ebu Velat".
Emulating the co-chair system from the PKK, Asya Abdullah was appointed the PYD’s co-chairwoman.
The PYD’s charter reads: "The PYD accepts Ocalan as commander and the Rojava’s Kongra-Gel [People's Congress of Kurdistan] as supreme legislative body."
The charter’s section on membership sets "a belief in commander Ocalan and his democratic living" as a condition for membership in the organization.
At the group’s meetings, it discussed means of accumulating finances and assuming a political role. It began to set up anonymous administrations by convincing other groups -- or threatening them -- and achieving influence in the central government in Damascus.
These groups eventually started to achieve more economic, military and political gains in Syria.
Since November of 2011, experienced PKK members in Iraq’s Qandil Mountains were sent to Syria -- this is how the YPG, the armed wing of the PYD, was initially formed.
YPG members engaged in clashes in northern Syria with the Nusra Front and Daesh terrorist group, which helped the PYD garner support from western countries and Russia.
Eliminating competition
Unlike other Kurdish parties, the PYD did not participate in the Syrian uprising, which erupted in March of 2011.
To achieve its desired goals, the PYD and the Kurdish National Council held meetings in Iraq’s Erbil, capital of the Kurdish northern region, to which all parties agreed -- on July 11, 2012 -- to move together.
The agreement called for the establishment of armed forces to defend all areas in which Kurds live in northern Syria, while the Kurdish Supreme Committee -- which contains five members from both groups -- would mediate any political disputes.
Within the context of reconciliation between the Syrian regime and the PYD, regime forces withdrew from northern Syria to be replaced by members of the PYD and Kurdish parties.
Though the administration of these areas was carried out under the terms of the Erbil agreement, the PYD has established control over them using the YPG. It has blocked other Kurdish political parties from practicing politics in these areas, thus violating the terms of the Erbil deal.
'Cantons'
In January of 2014, the PYD declared Al-Hasakah in northeastern Syria, Kobani and Efrin in Aleppo (which had been handed over to the PYD by the regime) and Tal Abyad city in Raqqah to be "cantons" after seizing them from Daesh with the support of the U.S.-led coalition.
Other Kurdish parties, for their part, announced their rejection of these cantons, which were imposed as facts on the ground by the PYD.
The US, Russia and the regime
Instead of being a direct participant in the ongoing war in Syria, the PYD has focused on its own narrow interests.
As it has avoided fighting pro-Assad forces, the PYD has actually helped the regime and become one of its trusted allies.
The PYD-held Al-Sheikh Maqsoud district in Aleppo and the oilfields in Al-Hasakah saw a few clashes between the PYD and the regime, after which the latter's forces evacuated the areas to the PYD.
The spread of the Daesh terrorist group gave the PYD new chances to expand its influence, as the group used its fighting with Daesh to garner foreign support and perceived legitimacy in the international arena.
Within this context, the PYD has established a special relationship with the U.S., becoming an important "ally" for Washington in the Syrian war -- all in the name of fighting Daesh.
The PYD has also benefited from stepped-up competition between Russia and the U.S.
In October of 2015, the PYD began establishing relations with Moscow, from which it has received military support. Russian warplanes now provide air cover to the group’s ongoing operations against anti-regime opposition groups.
- Anadolu Agency correspondent Mahmoud Barakat contributed to this report from Ankara.
