Tribe leaders from Deir ez-Zor spoke on the Syrian crisis ongoing for ten years. Asserting that a resolution should be designed considering the heterogeneous structure in Syria, tribal leaders pointed to a decentralized administration instead of centralized administration on the way for a solution.

Salim Mihemed, an opinion leader from El-Xelef tribe said: “We have many reasons to support the suggestion of a pluralist government. The Syrian crisis has been continuing for ten years. Peoples have suffered too much due to this crisis. In a decentralized administration, everyone would be able to take part in the administration, which would thus be a pluralistic form of government. Within this context, the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria is a system that could serve as a model. Hundreds of thousands of people had to immigrate due to policies of Damascus government that bases on centralised administration.”

Mihemed stated that the Damascus government adopted an oppressive regime and tried to control the whole region by use of force and pressure. Emphasizing that Damascus government ignored the pluralist social structure in Syria, he continued, “We reject this form of government. We have suffered too much for 50 years. Even the slogans of ‘Equality, Liberty and Justice’ have been never realistic for the government. They used violence and force against all opponents. In order to maintain their political position, they caused the half of Syrian people’s immigration. The most proper resolution for the Syria crisis is a decentralised administration.”

An opinion leader from the Mersûmi tribe, Hewas Dêr El Casim, said: “As the peoples of Syria, we opt for a democratic, pluralist and decentralised Syria. We have been struggling for this for many years. All the tyrant regimes that have governed Syria until today imposed monist policies and ignored the pluralist structure in Syria. We have resisted to those policies up to today and we will continue to do so. Thousands of our people were martyred in struggle. We will continue to struggle until a free and democratic Syria is built.”

Casim, expressing that great powers which have intervened in Syria seek to realize their own interests, said: “They do not want the Syrian peoples to unite. They only seek their own interests and put their own interests before those of the Syrian peoples. We reject these plans. We want a Syria in which people would live united; not a fragmented Syria.”