Turkey takes advantage of world preoccupation with coronavirus to make demographic change in Tal Abyad – human rights center
North-Press Agency
Turkey has started work on the second phase of its scheme demographic change in northern Syria, specifically in the area of Tal Abyad. This comes in light of the world's preoccupation with the coronavirus crisis.
The Violations Documentation Center in Northern Syria (VDC-NSY), quoting three local sources, said that on Wednesday morning, Turkey began transferring families of its armed militants within the “First Legion” group in the opposition’s Syrian National Army to Tal-Abyad.
VDC-NSY mentioned that in this period, 18 buses loaded with militants’ families moved from the Hawar Kilis military crossing in northern Aleppo to Akçakale in Sanliurfa province, southeastern Turkey, to cross into Syrian town of Tal Abyad.
In his speech to the Ministers of Social Affairs of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation in Istanbul on December 9th, Turkish President Erdogan announced that his country started working on housing a million people in the areas of Tal Abyad and Sere Kaniye (Ras al-Ain).
On November 21st last year, quoting sources, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights confirmed that a number of residents of Syria’s north had been transferred to the town of Tal Abyad, which is controlled by the Turkish forces and their affiliated armed groups.
Sources confirmed to the Observatory that Turkish forces carry out operations transporting citizens who wish to move to Tal Abyad, where escort cars depart daily in the morning and evening after registering the names of those who wish to move, to be transferred with their properties and necessities from Jarablus to the border with Turkey, and then on to Tal Abyad.
Mine victims
In a separate context, in a post published on its website on Tuesday, VDC-NSY said that nine civilians in the countrysides of Kobani and Tal Abyad lost their lives last March due to mines planted by Turkish forces and their affiliated armed opposition groups.
VDC-NSY stated that there are four children among the number of civilians who lost their lives, and that Turkish mines injured 14 people, including four cases that led to amputations and permanent disabilities.
It said that Turkish-backed armed groups intensified mining in the vicinity of the M4 highway and the nearby villages in the two areas.
It added that the lands that were mined are close to residential areas and roads where the explosions resulted in the injury of a large number of civilians.
On March 25th, North-Press reported that a child lost his life and two others were seriously injured as a result of a mine planted by armed opposition groups in the village of al-Zaytouna in the countryside of Tal Abyad, northern Raqqa.
Turkish forces and armed opposition groups took control of the areas of Sere Kaniye (Ras al-Ain) and Tal Abyad (Gre-Spi) after a military operation launched against northeastern Syria in October of last year, causing the displacement of more than 300,000 civilians to camps in the areas of Hasakah, Derik and camps in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, according to UN statistics.