IDLIB, Syria (North Press) – Turkish gendarmerie troops purposely fire at civilians who try to cross the Syrian-Turkish border, while those who are arrested for long hours are beaten and tortured, according to residents of Idlib, northwest Syria.
On March 9, a civilian from Rasafa village, east Idlib countryside, was shot by Turkish border guards while trying to pass into Turkish territory from Harim near the Syrian-Turkish border.
Successive targeting
Amer Danaro, a 43-year-old IDP of the city of Halfaya, north Hama living in al-Karamah camps north of Idlib, says that Turkish border guards fired directly on a group he was in trying to pass into Turkey last month.
The shooting wounded one woman in the leg, and Turkish gendarmeries arrested the group of 35 people, including women and children. “All young men were severely beaten by Turks, showing no mercy,” according to Danaro.
About 464 civilians, including 84 children and 44 women, have been killed by Turkish gendarmerie since the beginning of the Syrian war, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
On February 4, a young man from the west Idlib countryside was killed by Turkish gendarmerie in an area in the west Idlib countryside.
On February 23, a man and his wife were killed by Turkish gendarmerie while they were trying to pass into Turkish territory from Kherbet Eljoz, west Idlib.
Failed attempts
The deteriorating and poor living conditions in Idlib, which is a Hayat Tahrir al-Sham-held (HTS) area, forces people to take the risk of crossing the border into Turkey, according to people trying to pass into Turkey illegally.
Yassin al-Hassan, a 23-year-old IDP from Ma`arat al-Nu`man, south of Idlib, living in a camp north Idlib, failed to cross the border for the second time in February.
He said that the during the first attempt, Turkish gendarmeries ambushed him near the border wall between the Syrian-Turkish territory, where they managed to arrest about 50 people, including about 15 women and children who were trying to cross the border.
Turkish gendarmeries did not hit the young men as they used to do previously, “but they handed us to the Levant Front, which beat us severely; after that, they released the group after each one paid 100 Turkish lira.”
Meanwhile, during the second attempt, al-Hassan dealt with another smuggler and started his attempt at dawn from the city of ad-Dana and then to the town of Atme near the border, north Idlib, after which a smuggler laid a wooden ladder on the border wall.
“We managed to cross the border, and after we walked for about 100 meters, a child started crying and we were exposed…Turkish gendarmeries fired at us indiscriminately and arrested the group and returned it to Syria,” he added.
Huge payments
In February 2016, Turkey started constructing the border wall on the Syrian-Turkish border with a length of 711 kilometers out of the 911 km Syrian-Turkish border, and finished it in June 2018. It is the third-longest wall in the world.
In late 2015, HTS constructed their Border Security Office, which is affiliated with the border department, in order to organize smuggling from Syria into Turkey.
Al-Hassan said that he paid $750 USD, and an additional $50 went to the office. “It is impossible for anyone to pass without paying this tax to HTS that has its offices throughout Urum al-Jawz, Harim, and other areas, through which smuggling is carried out,” he added.
A smuggler who preferred to be unnamed said that some smugglers deal with Turkish officers on duty at the border in order to smuggle people, “but this process costs $1800 for each person.”
“The smuggler pays half of the amount to the officers on duty,” he added.
The costs of smuggling differ according to the ages of people and the smuggling outlets, as families with children pay additional amounts due to “the difficulty of smuggling them,” according to the smuggler.
To smuggle a woman and two children costs $1,000, which increases with every child that needs smuggling. “Meanwhile, it is easier to smuggle young men, who pay between 600 and 800 $,” according to the smuggler.
He mentioned that the process of smuggling people into Turkey has declined during the past months due to the risky routes that have become exposed by “Turkish border guards, who have been recently firing directly at people on purpose.”
Two years ago, the smuggler managed to smuggle about 50 people to Turkish territory on daily basis, while now he cannot smuggle 50 people per month, “due to the intensive patrols by Turks and HTS.”