The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) have announced the postponement of a high-stakes visit by their commander, Mazloum Abdi, to Damascus, citing "technical reasons" for the delay. The announcement comes as the year-end deadline for the landmark "March 10 agreement" rapidly approaches, an accord intended to integrate the SDF's military and civil structures into Syrian state institutions. The SDF Media Center stated on Monday, December 29, that the visit, which was scheduled for the same day with a negotiating delegation, would be rescheduled by mutual agreement. While the SDF insists the delay is purely logistical and does not signal a change in the course of communications or the goals of the talks, the move casts further uncertainty over the fate of the stalled agreement.
The postponement highlights the deep divisions and lack of progress that have plagued the implementation of the March 10 agreement. Enab Baladi reports that despite repeated high-level meetings, including a key discussion between Syria’s transitional president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, and Abdi in October, the agreement's provisions remain pending, with neither side having implemented any of the agreed-upon steps. Compounding the confusion are the sharply diverging public statements from both parties. While sources within the SDF have expressed optimism about "points of convergence" and Abdi himself has stressed that dialogue "has not stopped," a source at the Syrian Ministry of Information told Enab Baladi that contacts and meetings with the SDF are "currently halted," a position echoed by Deputy Minister of Information Obada Koujan, who dismissed reports of an imminent agreement as "inaccurate."
At the heart of the deadlock is the mechanism for integrating the SDF’s military and security forces. The Syrian government recently submitted an official proposal based on the spirit of the March 10 agreement, offering an opportunity for the gradual integration of SDF fighters into the structure of the Syrian army. However, the SDF rejected this proposal, instead presenting an alternative on December 22 that called for the formation of three separate brigades dedicated to counterterrorism, border security, and women. This counter-proposal, according to sources, reflects the SDF’s desire to maintain a degree of organizational autonomy outside the framework of the Syrian army, a position that conflicts with the core tenet of the original agreement.
With the deadline for the agreement set to expire at the end of the year, the future of the accord is highly precarious. While SDF commander Abdi has denied that the agreement has any time limit and warned that a return to military solutions is "not on the table," public sentiment suggests a high degree of skepticism. An online poll conducted by Enab Baladi between December 24 and 27, 2025, revealed that only 25% of the 770 respondents expected implementation steps to begin. In contrast, a combined 75% anticipated either a military option (41%) or an extension of the agreement period (34%), underscoring the widespread belief that the current diplomatic efforts are failing to yield concrete results.
The March 10 agreement, which followed a similar "trial balloon" deal in Aleppo, was intended to resolve the status of the SDF-held territories by integrating their civil and military structures into the state. The Syrian Arab Republic Presidency has consistently maintained that while Kurdish rights are safeguarded within a single Syrian state, it firmly rejects any attempts to impose a partitioning reality or create separate entities under labels such as "self-administration" or federalism without a comprehensive national consensus. The ongoing failure to bridge the gap between the government's demand for full integration and the SDF's insistence on organizational autonomy means the fate of the agreement, and the stability of northeastern Syria, remains dangerously uncertain as the year draws to a close.
Photo: Enab Baladi