Syrian refugees from areas of Turkish invasion bid farewell to a year of grief

Duhok – North-Press Agency

"The year of grief has passed", this is what refugee Saadoun Ali described the year 2019, while he was buying some of the needs of the New Year's Day from the stalls that the refugees established in the middle of Barda-Rash camp in Kurdistan Region.

On the afternoon of the last day of 2019, Barda-Rash camp witnessed  a movement of buying and selling from the stalls of fruits and vegetables, and some types of nuts, but buying on New Year's Eve was difficult for most refugees because of the lack of purchasing power.

Ghalia Ali, a Syrian-Kurdish refugee said: "We cannot buy what our children ask for on the New Year's Eve, we hope we will celebrate next year in our homes and buy them what they ask for." While the organizations in the camp organized celebrations for the refugee children in the camp, and distributed gifts to the children in order to bring pleasure to their hearts on the New Year's Eve.

“My child has got a nice game, it's a good move," refugee Dalal Mahmoud said.

Refugee children inside the camp celebrated New Year's Eve in different ways, carrying balloons with slogans calling for peace and to return home in 2020. More than 350,000 civilians have been displaced into al-Jazira region in northeastern Syria due to the Turkish military invasion in northern Syria, while nearly 17,000 people have fled into Kurdistan Region, of whom about 12 thousand people settled in Barda-Rash camp, in Duhok governorate.

After the Turkish military invasion stopped by the ceasefire agreements, 1,800 people were able to return to their homes outside the areas of military operations, while about 11,000 people remained in the camp, who have been there for two months, as they bid farewell for 2019 with words filled with sorrow.