Violations by Turkey and its affiliated groups extend from southeastern Aleppo to northeastern Syria: Statement

ALEPPO, Syria – (North Press) The Syrian Democratic Alliance Party in northern Aleppo countryside said that armed groups that committed the massacres of Tel Aran and Tel Hasel, southeast of Aleppo, “participated with the Turkish forces and its mercenaries in killing our people in Afrin, Tel Abyad and Ras al-Ain, displacing them and seizing their lands, real estate, cultural heritage, stealing and looting their money, in addition to killing and slaughtering humans and burning trees."

The Syrian Democratic Alliance made a statement on the occasion of the seventh anniversary of the Tel Aran and Tel Hasel massacres on Monday, which was previously committed by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS, formerly al-Nusra Front) with the participation of some armed opposition groups in front of the party's building in Fafin district in northern Aleppo countryside.

Members of HTS, along with the opposition groups, committed a massacre against the residents of Tel Aran and Tel Hasel towns on 27 July 2013, killing about 50 civilians.

Through the statement, the party denounced the stance of the United Nations, the Security Council, the European Union, the League of Arab States, the International Organization for Human Rights and all human rights organizations for not taking any legal measures to hold the criminals who committed the massacres of Tel Aran and Tel Hasel responsible for their actions.

The statement said that the objective of the massacre was to displace Kurds from their villages, empty them of their people, and create Arab-Kurdish sedition.

In a statement made in Fafin district, the Shahba Council asked for condemnation of the massacres, for the international community, the UN Security Council, human rights organizations, and the Arab League to break their silence and press Turkey to leave northern Syria, to take the necessary measures to return forcibly displaced people to their cities and villages, and hold perpetrators of war accountable before international courts.

According to Shahba Council, Turkey repeats the killings, kidnappings, imposition of the Turkish language and flag, theft and destruction of archaeological sites, looting and destroying the archaeological sites, and the displacement of the indigenous people from their areas in the Turkish held-areas of Tel Aran and Tel Hasel.

The council called on the Syrian government to engage in constructive Syrian dialogue with the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria to reach a democratic political solution that prevents the Turkish occupation from dividing parts of northern Syria and annexing them in implementation of its “Ottoman ambitions.”

Reporting by Dejla Khalil, editing by Lucas Chapman