ALEPPO, Syria (North Press) – Early every morning, Mohammad Tari, who was displaced from northwestern Syria’s Afrin, takes his sheep to graze in lands near his house in the village of Tel Sosin in the northern countryside of Aleppo.
However, the lack of natural pastures, the spread of mines in the northern countryside of Aleppo, the high cost of fodder, and the inability to rent grazing land have all put a heavy burden on Tari, who was in different situation in two and a half years ago before he was displaced by the Turkish invasion of his homeland.
Since the invasion of Afrin by Turkish forces and their proxies on March 18, 2018, the region has been witnessing security chaos, explosions, and constant tension.
Turkish-backed armed opposition armed groups also practice continuous violations against the local populace, including theft of property, assault, kidnapping, and murder.
The Turkish operation also caused the displacement of more than 300,000 people from the Afrin region, according to statistics of the Human Rights Organization in Afrin.
Grazing in a minefield
Tari, who raised livestock for 25 years in his village of Jaqla, in the Shia district (Sheikh al-Hadid) in Afrin, said, “I have been raising livestock for about 25 years. In Afrin, harvest residues, orchards, and grazing are available three seasons a year.”
“I was only paying fodder costs in the winter, and that didn’t cost me a lot,” he said.
However, mines in the vicinity of Tel Sosin village prevent him from grazing his sheep in the vicinity. “Here there is no safe grazing due to the mines. I can’t take my sheep out of the village. Children and sheep were killed as a result of mine explosions,” he added.
Roj Kalko, an official with the Media and Documentation Office of the Kurdish Red Crescent, told North Press in a previous statement that the number of casualties from landmines and war remnants has reached about 77, and 31 deaths and 46 injuries were recorded since the displacement of the people of Afrin to the northern countryside of Aleppo.
According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, 356 people, including 70 women and 105 children, have lost their lives due to the explosion of mines and explosive devices and the collapse of damaged residential buildings in separate areas of Syria since January 2019.
A few minutes of milking
The shepherd’s wife, Zakia Mohammed, spends only a few minutes milking the family’s 20 sheep, while it used to take hours to milk the herd they had in Afrin.
“Previously, milking sheep took more than an hour. We were getting more than 30 kilograms of sheep’s milk every day; now it is barely enough for our children,” Mohammed said.
Before Turkey occupied Afrin, Mohammed used to make cheese, yoghurt, ghee, and cream, and kept its supplies for the winter, then sold the remaining milk.
“I used to have enough cheese, yogurt, labneh, ghee, and cream for the winter. We took our needs and sold the rest; we were managing our livelihood with that production.”
Before Turkey and its affiliated armed opposition group took control of it, the Afrin region was home to 150,000 sheep and goats, 5,000 cows and 39 poultry farms, according to an economist familiar with those numbers who preferred not to be named.
According to the economist, the loss of the livestock sector in Afrin region as a result of the Turkish operation amounted to 75% (an estimated $25 million).
The reasons for this loss are due to the death of large numbers of livestock due to Turkish bombing, the absence of breeders, and thousands of livestock being stolen by the armed opposition groups, according to the same source.
Shepherds from Afrin said that during their displacement journeys, they had to sell their livestock to traders from outside the area for a low price, for fear of their death.
“I was satisfied with my work. I managed the needs of my family, and my children’s expenses,” Tari added.
My sheep starved to death
With the intensification of clashes on the outskirts of his village, the bombing of Turkish planes, and the fall of shells on the second day of the attacks, Tari was forced to leave his village, his home, and his sheep, to try, as the others, to save his family from death.
The Human Rights Organization in Afrin documented, in a report published on the 16th of January, the death of 489 civilians from the Afrin region as a result of Turkish bombing.
Tari traveled 40 kilometers with his family and 150 sheep on foot, until he arrived to the city of Afrin.
“We were forcibly displaced and left our houses at night; I left about 25 lambs behind. Because the lambs could not walk, I decided to bring them later,” he said.
Residents of the countryside of Afrin were seeking refuge in the city at the time, fleeing the horror of the battles and clashes in its vicinity.
The next morning, Tari decided to return to his home and save his lambs, but the violent bombardment prevented him from returning.
“My little lambs died of thirst and starvation,” he sighed.
“The armed group burnt my house, even though they knew it was a house of a poor shepherd,” he continued.
They sold my sheep
Tari left Afrin on March 17, 2018, walking with his family on Mount Lilon in Sherawa sub-district, south of Afrin, to reach areas in the northern countryside of Aleppo.
“We were forcibly displaced and left our houses,” Tari said.
Because the shepherd didn’t have a van to get his herd out of town, “I sent my wife and daughters with some relatives on a tractor, while my son and I walked on foot.”
Days later, Tari learned that members of the Turkish backed groups had stolen his sheep, and “heard that they had sold them in the city of Azaz.”
Tari describes to North Press the scene of the displacement of Afrin residents. “Women carrying their children and some bags, elderly people climbing the mountain with great difficulty, and the cries of children with the sounds of passing cars, it was painful.”
He described his life as an IDP. “I arrived here, having neither a house nor olive trees. I am displaced and the condition of the displaced is known.”