Syria’s government has struck an agreement with the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) that control the northeast of the country to integrate the group into the national army in the push for a nationwide ceasefire.

The deal could give impetus to attempts to persuade Turkey that the SDF can no longer be equated with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which Ankara views as “terrorist”, and that the Kurds in northeastern Syria should be left in peace to form some level of part-autonomy under ultimate Syrian government control. The development dovetails with the immediate ceasefire with Turkey that the Iraq-headquartered PKK declared on March 1 as well as, to some extent, with the Turkish government demand that not only the PKK, but the SDF also lay down their arms.

The Kurdish-led authority gained autonomy over the region in 2012 during the early chapters of the multi-sided war that was fought in Syria until the Assad regime collapsed three months ago. The SDF is the military wing of the Democratic Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (DAANES), sometimes called Rojava.

The deal is to be carried out by year’s end. All public institutions in the northeast, including borders, airports and oilfields, are to come under the control of the new Syrian government that has taken shape in Damascus.

The deal will recognise Kurdish rights. They were long refused under the dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad. It prohibited the use of the Kurdish language in schools and banned Kurdish holidays. The announcement of the agreement brought cheering crowds to the street in Raqqa, northeast Syria, and in Damascus, news agencies reported.

Soon after coming to power, Syria’s transitional president, Ahmed al-Sharaa—whose Turkey-endorsed jihadist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) spearheaded the militias that conducted the military offensive that caused Assad to flee to Russia in December—engaged the SDF in talks to consolidate full Syrian government control over the country.

Back on December 19, the commander of the SDF, Mazloum Abdi, said that Kurdish fighters who came to Syria from around the Middle East to fight for his militia alongside Syrian Kurdish fighters would leave if Turkey agreed a total ceasefire on clashes taking place in northern Syria.

"There is a different situation in Syria [following the fall of the Assad regime two weeks ago], we are now starting a political stage. Syrians must solve their problems themselves and establish a new administration," Abdi told Reuters.

He added: "We are now preparing, after a total ceasefire between us and the Turkish forces and their affiliated factions, to join this stage.

"Because there are new developments in Syria, it is time for the fighters who helped us in our war to return to their areas with their heads held high."

The SDF is mainly made up of fighters from the Kurdish YPG militia, which Turkey also does not distinguish from the insurgent PKK.

The SDF served as the main fighting force in an alliance with Washington formed to bring down the the self-declared Syrian and Iraqi caliphate of Islamic State, which was defeated six years ago. The SDF and the US say there is still work to do in stamping out remnants of Islamic State and ensuring it is not resurgent in the new Syria.