Syria’s AANES warns of new displacement in case of Turkish operation
RAQQA, Syrian (North Press) – The Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES) warned on Saturday of new waves of displacement in case Turkey launches a military operation inside Syrian territory.
Sheikhmous Ahmad, co-chair of the IDPs and Refugees Affairs Office in the AANES, said that any potential military action by Turkey would cause waves of displacement, as happened in previous military operations launched by the Turkish forces.
The AANES was first formed in 2014 in the Kurdish-majority regions of Afrin, Kobani and Jazira in northern Syria following the withdrawal of the government forces. Later, it was expanded to Manbij, Tabqa, Raqqa, Hasakah and Deir ez-Zor after the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) defeated ISIS militarily.
Camps run by AANES are houses for about 147.146 IDPs, residing in 16 camps in addition to dozens of informal camps.
Turkey has a political goal in the area which is to change the region’s demographics. So, it is deliberately emptying the areas it occupies of the original inhabitants, he added.
On May 23, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey is preparing for a new military operation in northern Syria to establish a 30-km deep safe zone along its southern border.
The Turkish safe zone is an area 30-35 km (19-22 miles) deep into Syrian territory that Turkey started establishing in 2019, claiming that it aims at housing Syrian refugees in an area along its border with Syria, as well as to keep it free from the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which it regards as terrorists.
On Wednesday Erdogan renewed threats of a military offensive in northern Syria, claiming to “clean up Tal Rifat and Manbij,” in a reference to two northern Syrian cities.
Any potential Turkish military operation will worsen the already ongoing humanitarian crisis that the IDPs suffer from in the AANES-held areas, according to Ahmad.
The options of humanitarian response over the supposed waves of displacement are very limited, with the possibility that many humanitarian organizations will withdraw from the area once the military operation begins, he further explained.
Most of the camps in the AANES-held areas suffer from a shortage in the basic needs that IDPs require, especially after many international organizations moved to humanitarian intervention in Ukraine after war has started there, Ahmad stated.