National Coordination Committee for Democratic Change

This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these messages) This article needs to be updated. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information. (July 2017) This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "National Coordination Committee for Democratic Change" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (May 2013) (Learn how and when to remove this message) This article's factual accuracy may be compromised due to out-of-date information. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information. (August 2015) This article is missing information about the coalition's activities after the fall of the Assad regime. Please expand the article to include this information. Further details may exist on the talk page. (February 2025) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

National Coordination Committee/National Coordination Body
هيئة التنسيق الوطنية لقوى التغيير الديمقراطي

Abbreviation	NCC or NCB
Formation	2011
Headquarters	Damascus, Syria
Region served	Syria
Chairman	Hassan Abdel Azim
Website	www.syrncc.org

The National Coordination Committee for Democratic Change (NCC), or National Coordination Body for Democratic Change^[1] (NCB) (Arabic: هيئة التنسيق الوطنية لقوى التغيير الديمقراطي), is a Syrian coalition of opposition movements formed at the onset of the Syrian civil war. Chaired by Hassan Abdel Azim, it consists of 13 left-wing political parties and "independent political and youth activists".^[2] It has been defined by Reuters as the internal opposition's main umbrella group.^[3] The NCC initially had several Kurdish political parties as members, but all except for the Democratic Union Party left in October 2011 to join the Kurdish National Council.^[4]

At the beginning of the civil war, relations with other Syrian opposition groups were generally poor. The Syrian Revolution General Commission, the Local Coordination Committees of Syria or the Supreme Council of the Syrian Revolution were critical of the NCC's calls to dialogue with the Syrian government.^[5] In September 2012, the Syrian National Council (SNC) reaffirmed that despite broadening its membership, it would not join with "currents close to [the] NCC".^[6] Despite recognizing the Free Syrian Army on 23 September 2012,^[7] the FSA has dismissed the NCC as an extension of the government, stating that "this opposition is just the other face of the same coin".^[3] Some opposition activists have accused the NCC of being a front organization for Bashar al-Assad's government and some of its members of being ex-government insiders.^[8]

The NCC differed from the SNC on two main points of strategy:

1) The NCC refused to accept foreign military intervention, although it did accept various forms of support for the opposition and supports Arab League involvement in the conflict.

2) It tried to emphasise nonviolent resistance to the Syrian government, despite endorsing the Free Syrian Army.

Eventually, the NCC cooperated with the Syrian National Coalition as part of the Syrian peace efforts.