TEL TAMR, Syria (North Press) – Residents of dozens of villages in the northern countryside of the town of Tel Tamr, north of Syria’s Hasakah, have been suffering from a month-long power outage due to the Turkish targeting of the high tension networks and electricity cables.
In early 2021, Turkish forces and their affiliated armed opposition groups targeted villages and a power station in the northern countryside of Tel Tamr with artillery and heavy weapons, cutting off power to 45 villages.
Tel Tamr’s villages located on the front lines with Turkish forces and armed opposition groups have been subjected to repeated attacks since the Turkish offensive on both Sere Kaniye (Ras al-Ain) and Gire Spi (Tel Abyad) in late 2019.
Deliberate targeting
Local residents accuse Turkish forces of deliberately targeting the electricity networks, especially last year when they caused power outages more than once.
Abdulfatah Muhammad, from Khweitla village, accused Turkey of deliberately targeting the electricity network.
“They target our villages at night, and when the power goes out, the bombing stops,” Muhammad said.
In February 2020, Turkish-backed armed groups bombed the village of Umm al-Keyf, damaging high-tension lines and cutting power to the entire region.
On the sixth of September 2020, the Turkish bombing of the village of Abush, north of Tel Tamr, caused a power interruption to 28 villages.
Meanwhile, residents of hundreds of houses in the western countryside of the town have been suffering from blackouts for more than a year due to the damage in the main lines within the area held by the Turkish forces and their affiliated armed groups.
No power, no water
Repeated power outages affect the ability to obtain water in rural areas, since most of the villages depend on electricity to pump water from wells.
“We rely on electricity to extract water from wells, and municipal tanks in the winter can’t reach our villages because of the mud and bad roads in winter,” Muhammad said.
He added that most of the residents of the northern villages do not have generators, which causes great suffering for the villagers because of the darkness.
Muhanad Abush, a resident of Abush village north of Tel Tamr, told North Press that the repeated Turkish bombing displaced the majority of the population from their villages, that most of the villages are almost empty, and if the situation continues like this, the rest may also flee.
“It has been more than forty days without electricity. We are in a difficult situation. As long as there is no electricity, there is no water,” Abush added.
Frontlines
Fahed Same’la, an administrator in the town’s Power Directorate, said that the reason for the delay in repairing the lines is because they “can’t maintain the line because it is located in the frontlines.”
The frontline between the Turkish forces and the Syrian government forces in Tel Tamr extends 40 km, while the damage to the electricity network is concentrated within a kilometer and a half.
Maintenance teams of the Electricity Directorate are afraid to enter the frontline areas for fear of being targeted by the Turkish army and armed groups.
In February 2020, seven workers from the energy office of the Autonomous Administration in the countryside of Zargan were injured when a mine exploded while they were trying to repair a high tension line.
Usually, the maintenance workshops of the Electricity Directorate in Tel Tamr repair the damage, after days of coordination with the Russian forces.
“We can’t get there unless we coordinate with the Russian forces. We tried to coordinate with them seven times, but we weren’t able to enter the area because the Russian forces didn’t come,” Same’la added.
“About 45 villages are affected by the electricity cutoff. This time, the damage was more than previous times. A kilometer and a half is ruined; the network collapsed and the electrical insulators are broken,” Same’la said.