US-backed YPG mourns Castro's death while Trump condemns Cuban leader as 'brutal dictator'

PKK's U.S.-backed Syrian offshoot, the Democratic Union Party (PYD) on Saturday mourned the death of Fidel Castro in Syria while President-elect Donald Trump on Saturday called former Cuban leader a "brutal dictator who oppressed his people for six decades".

YPG fighters, who claim to follow the socialist leader's footsteps, paid a tribute to the 90-year-old leader, opening banners in Rojava [northern Syria] that reads "Hasta siempre , comandante".



Meanwhile, in another part of the world, Trump, in a statement released after Castro's death, said he hoped the death would clear the way "toward a future in which the wonderful Cuban people finally live in the freedom they so richly deserve."

Trump said Castro left a legacy of "firing squads, theft, unimaginable suffering, poverty and the denial of fundamental human rights."

The Obama administration has been working with the YPG against Daesh in Syria and disregarding Turkish concerns over ethnic cleansing in northern Syria. Moreover, Turkey sees the YPG's presence in northern Syria as a threat to its national security and its sovereignty.

In Washington, many experts already expressed possible reverse effects of the arming and equipping of a terrorist group whose main body targets a U.S. ally. Trump's Foreign Policy Adviser Walid Phares told Daily Sabah recently that American support for the YPG would be reviewed if there is any operational connection with the PKK.