Iraq’s Sudani Pushes Turkish-Syrian Rapprochement
2024-06-10355 view
Iraqi Prime Minister Muhammad Shia al-Sudani told Turkish news channel Habertürk in late May that Iraq is attempting to mediate a resolution to the bitter, years-long divide between Ankara and the Syrian regime. Türkiye and the Syrian regime have had a highly complex relationship, particularly since the start of the Syrian revolution in 2011—so what chance do Sudani’s efforts stand of succeeding?
Sudani’s Political Calculations
It is clear that Sudani, who is hoping to be elected for a second term next year, sees political capital to be gained from a successful mediation. By presenting himself as a regional peacemaker, he hopes to win a degree of external support to counterbalance domestic pressures from Shiite political leaders in the Coordination Framework bloc, who may step up to challenge him for the top job.
By unveiling the mediation efforts via Turkish TV, the Iraqi premier also sent an indirect message to his interlocutors in Ankara. Turkish opposition parties, which gained momentum with a sweeping triumph at local elections in March, have repeatedly voiced their desire to normalize relations with the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Sudani’s intervention may encourage them to exert still greater pressure on President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to engage with the Iraqi initiative, in order to address the question of millions of Syrian refugees living on Turkish soil.
Moreover, Sudani appears to believe that moving the focus of engagement with Damascus from security to politics, by launching a political process that could overhaul the image of the Syrian regime, might represent the beginning of a solution for the Syrian conflict. Arab rapprochement with the Assad regime cannot gain momentum as long as Türkiye remains outside the process. Continued tensions between Ankara and Damascus, including over a political solution to the Syrian crisis, represent a knotty political obstacle to any initiative towards reconciliation between the Syrian regime and its Turkish and Arab neighbors. Indeed, Sudani made a point of emphasizing this in a phone call with Assad earlier this week.
Major Obstacles Remain
The most prominent challenge the Iraqi premier faces in his mediation efforts is the lack of trust between Türkiye and the Syrian regime. Ankara is still extremely wary towards Damascus, fears that Erdoğan has voiced on more than one occasion and labeled as the most prominent obstacle to reconciliation with the Assad regime, especially after previous attempts by Russia to mediate a rapprochement failed to achieve any tangible results. All this adds to the difficulty of the Iraqi mission.
For its part, Damascus has been highly critical of Ankara’s role in the Syrian crisis, especially the support Türkiye has provided to Syrian opposition forces—something the regime continues to denounce publicly. This aspect of the dispute will inevitably play some role in determining the success or otherwise of Iraq’s mediation initiative.
The scale of this challenge was reflected in Erdoğan’s visit to Baghdad in mid-March, and the April visit of the head of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces, Falih Al-Fayyadh, to Damascus, in order to find common ground between Syria and Türkiye. Iraq is keen to arrange a meeting between Turkish and Syrian officials in Baghdad, but their mutual reservations and a lack of trust between them have so far thwarted such an initiative.
It is important to note that despite regional and international challenges to Iraq’s mediation efforts, particularly by the United States and Israel, Sudani’s government is trying to leverage the complex geography between Türkiye and Syria, seeing their shared concern over the Kurdish issue as a potential common ground for consensus. The two sides have little common ground on which to build more normal relations, as demonstrated by the suspension in mid-2023 of normalization efforts involving Moscow, Tehran, Ankara, and Damascus. That said, their interests overlap enough to allow for some compromise arrangements along their shared border, especially in northwestern Syria.
It should also be mentioned that Turkish and Syrian officials had already been engaging in regular meetings before Al-Sudani’s mediation, although their negotiations over these areas are very complex due to the war. Indeed, the entire demographic, security and economic reality in these areas stems from years of war. It may be that the two sides reach a series of security and economic deals relating to northwestern Syria, albeit excluding part of the borders due to the presence of Iranian and Russian forces and other armed actors there.
Iran Has Most to Gain
Any potential rapprochement between Türkiye and the Syrian regime would represent a major prize for Iran, specifically in the Syrian arena, as such a development would transform Türkiye’s role there in ways that would make it more compatible with that of Iran. PMF leader Fayyadh’s involvement and the Coordination Framework’s support for the mediation efforts also suggest that Iran supports the initiative. What Iran has failed to obtain from Türkiye through Russian, Iranian and Turkish-led Astana process, it could obtain via the Iraqi-led process. This has piqued Iran’s interest in this mediation, which comes at a timely moment as it could also play a role in the transition of its regional policy following the deaths of President Ebrahim Raisi and Amir Abdullahian.
A glance at the nature of the gains Iran could obtain from any rapprochement between Türkiye and the Syrian regime suggest it would be highly supportive of Al-Sudani’s initiative. An Iraqi-mediated rapprochement would boost Iran’s regional role, possibly serving as a regional launchpad for further political victories in the context efforts for a political solution to the war in Gaza.
Iran’s acceptance of a Turkish military operation in northern Iraq, expected to take place in the summer, is intended to give Tehran leverage in the context of Iraq’s mediation initiative. Iran realizes the importance of linking the military benefits Türkiye hopes to achieve from the operation, with the political advantages it could itself reap from Iraq’s mediation. Thus, Iran is likely to be the biggest winner from the strategic transformations underway in Iraqi-Turkish-Syrian relations. Tehran is hoping this will prepare it to make the most of the benefits it may gain from the end of the war in Gaza, in the context of a new Middle East where Iran hopes to have a preponderant position.
