Mewan Dolamari
BasNews, Erbil
On the night of August 13th, Kurdish Peshmerga forces with the support of US military advisers met near Sinjar Mountain, intent on forming a plan to attack Sinjar town which lay far below, crawling with IS militants that have since taken over the city.
However according to Peshmerga sources, their efforts have been hindered, , by guerrillas of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and Kurdish Communities Protection Units (YPG), who requested use of their forces as well to help fight in Sinjar.
Furthermore sources from the US government in Washington, PKK threats hindered and caused US commanders’ plan to recapture Sinjar to fail. The US is not ready to cooperate with PKK, as it is registered as a terrorist group on the US list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations.
Meanwhile, a senior PKK commander didn’t reject those information that they became obstacle in front of Peshmerga force in freeing Sinjar.
“Even though I don’t have a lot of information about the events you are talking about, but Sinjar is part of Kurdistan and its our land and we will protect it as well,” Tekoshar Zagros a senior PKK commander told BasNews.
A Peshmerga commander in Sinjar told BasNews that the YPG, the Syrian-Kurdish wing of the PKK, has opened a military training center in the Sinjar Mountains for members of the Yazidi Reform Movement. The movement, which believes Yazidis are not Kurds, has brewed strong feelings of hatred within the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), who is doing all they can to help the stranded Yazidis.
The commander also stated that after control of Sinjar by the Islamic State (IS) insurgents on 6 August, Peshmerga forces fought tirelessly to rescue tens of thousands of Yazidi refugees on Sinjar Mountain that fled there to protect themselves by opening a road from Sinjar Mountain to Syrian Kurdistan. The refugees were then assisted to Zakho, Duhok through the Semelka Border crossing.
After rescuing Yazidi refugees, Peshmerga forces, with the cooperation of YPG and PKK fighters, went to Sinjar Mountain to make plans of ousting IS from Sinjar city. Trouble has been brewing as PKK and YPG try and convince people that the Peshmerga forces have not, in fact, been protecting people and will not do so in Sinjar areas.
Media close to the PKK spread rumors that the YPG and PKK forces originally took control back the Yazidi majority town from IS, yet the area is still quite heavily under the control of the Islamic State.
