Kurdish bloc walks out of SNC

The Kurdish bloc has walked out of the Syrian National Council (SNC), raising even more doubts about the Syrian opposition's ability to present a united front and viable alternative to President Bashar al-Assad's regime. Syrian Kurdish opposition leader Abdul-Baki Yousef, a leading member of the Kurdish Yakiti party in Syria and former member of the Kurdish National Council, charged host country Turkey with "pressuring the SNC" to omit the demands of the Kurdish opposition members in the final constitution document outlining a transition plan for Syria. "Our goal was to unify with the opposition and come up with a patriotic agreement that makes an umbrella for the whole opposition, but unfortunately the Turkish sponsor was very sensitive toward the Kurdish issue," Yousef told Lebanon's The Daily Star. "We accuse the Turkish government of putting pressure on the council." He said that the SNC is dominated by Islamists and the Muslim Brotherhood.