Afrin Post
On February 22nd, the Syrians for Truth and Justice Organization issued a report that presented the tragic situation in the occupied Kurdish region of Afrin, previously affiliated to the Self-Administration, and in particular the situation in the “Shieh / Sheikh Al-Hadid” district.
The report said: “The factions affiliated with the“ National Army ”supported by Turkey and controlling the Sheikh Al-Hadid region in the Kurdish-majority Afrin region, are following a policy characterized by intimidation and economic restrictions on the local Kurdish population, remaining in their homes and villages, in what appears to be a policy followed by forcing the remaining indigenous peoples to leave and be displaced, according to the interpretations of the people whom the Syrians interviewed for the truth. These mainly imposed by the Sulaiman Shah / Al Amshaat faction include the imposition of various types of taxes and royalties on homes, lands, agricultural crops and shops, in addition to other practices that lie in confiscating homes belonging to civilians who have been expelled from them. It can be said that these factions are arbitrarily controlling all commercial operations since they took control of the Afrin region in mid-March 2018.
On the authority of Sheikh Al-Hadid, the report said: “Sheikh Al-Hadid (Shieh) is one of the seven districts of Afrin al-Saba, located northwest of Syria at the Syrian-Turkish border. The area of Sheikh Al-Hadid is 93.52 square kilometers, and the population is 13871 people, according to the census Population statistics for the year 2004.
Currently, the “Sultan Suleiman Shah / Amshaat Brigade” faction mainly controls the district in addition to the presence of the “Waqas Brigade” in some villages surrounding the district center.
According to field researchers of Syrians for Truth and Justice, the percentage of the Kurdish population remaining in the area during the “Olive Branch” operation does not exceed 20 percent, as hundreds of families were moved from other governorates to the district after controlling it in March 2018, and it is indicated that most These families were forcibly displaced and / or internally displaced from the governorates of Damascus, Homs, Hama, and Idlib, and they were resettled in the district, and the children of a large part of these families are fighters in the ranks of the “Syrian National Army” affiliated to the Syrian Provisional Government linked to the Syrian opposition coalition.
During the second half of 2019, Syrians documented for the sake of truth and justice “the arrest of 506 people throughout the Afrin region, including 64 people from the Sheikh Al-Hadid region itself”. For the purpose of monitoring practices and violations committed in the region, field researchers met with Syrians for truth and justice more than ten eyewitnesses of Kurds who are affected by the practices and harassment that have reached the point of stealing their economic rights and controlling the sources of livelihood, in addition to four “internally displaced persons” who were transferred to the Afrin area from Homs and Damascus countryside, they talked about the intentional harassment of the Kurdish population, in addition to that A researcher met a leader of a group within the national army, which revealed some of the practices that targeted residents of the Kurds in particular.
