North-western Syria, the voices from the camp for displaced persons in the Kurdish area in Shabha: “We are under siege here, the militias are blocking aid”

ROME (DIRE agency) – “Our refugee camp is under siege: Turkish troops and pro-Ankara militias in the North and East, armed groups close to Iran in the West, Syrian armed forces in the South. Aid to support us after the earthquake should go through dozens of checks- point and whoever wanted to send them would have to pay very expensive taxes. We ask the international community to make the effort to come here in person and help us directly because we are isolated”. The appeal – entrusted to theSAY agency – is from journalist and activist Jan Hasan. He is in the refugee camp for displaced persons of Shahba, in the governorate of Aleppo, in northern Syria, less than fifty kilometers from the homologous capital.

Testimony from the IDP camp. The region is among those affected by the earthquake that caused victims and destruction in southern Turkey and, precisely, in northern Syria. Several aftershocks starting from yesterday’s dawn, up to 7.9 degrees of magnitude on the Richter scale and with epicenter in the Turkish province of Kahramanmaras, the strongest, and then also in Gaziantep and others. Over 5 thousand victims in the two countries, according to official sources. Hasan lives in Shabha with about 1,500 displaced people, where he coordinates a small NGO, and is in direct contact with his hometown, Jeindireis. The locality is a suburb of Afrin, a Kurdish majority city, one of the most affected by the earthquake located about fifteen kilometers to the north-west, also in the governorate of Aleppo. “I fled from Jeindireis, where 84 buildings collapsed, when there was the Turkish military operation in 2018 and I settled here with my family in Shabha – reports Hasan – the refugee camp is made up of tents and low houses and this caused little damage from the tremors, only a few people were injured. But we are still afraid and sleep in cars, despite the fact that it is very cold and it rains continuously”.

“At least 15 of my relatives have lost their lives.” The activist continues: “My hometown was instead among the hardest hit by the earthquake. We are talking about a city of just over 25,000 inhabitants which is likely to have at least 1,000 victims”. The effects of the tremors have also affected Hasan personally. “At least 15 of my relatives have lost their lives, from what I know at the moment”. The earthquake hit a country already debilitated by a civil war that has lasted since 2011 and which has led to a division of the territory into zones of influence of militias, armies and regional powers. Shabha, according to Hasan’s reconstruction, seems to be emblematic of the fragmentation that characterizes the country: “The camp is supported by the Afrin Council and by the autonomous authorities of Northern and North-Eastern Syria, also with Kurdish origins. These organizations provide free electricity , three hours a day, and drinking water”, explains the activist.

Aid is difficult: the work of a German NGO. “The area of ​​the governorate of Aleppo, where we are, is officially under the control of the Syrian opposition militias, supported directly by Turkey. And the refugee camp is effectively besieged on all fronts: the Turks, the pro militias – Iran, and then the armed forces in the service of the government of President Bashar al-Assad, who have set up numerous checkpoints and who impose the payment of heavy taxes on anyone who tries to bring something to the inhabitants of the camp”. From all this derives a substantial isolation, which the organization managed by Hasan, supported by the German NGO Sos Afrin of Pastor Oliver Keske, she managed to alleviate. “We managed to deliver baskets of food to the inhabitants, but the blockade that has been imposed on us is shocking”.

The appeal to the international community. “Come here and support us directly: don’t go through the Syrian government, as United Nations agencies do: that aid largely ends up in nothing”. Hasan’s words come in a context of conflict that not even the earthquake, one of the most devastating of the last century according to consensus experts, has managed to stop. “Yesterday”, finally reports the activist, “Turkish troops fired artillery shells at the cultivated fields near the village, just to instill terror. By now we have become accustomed to this: Ankara strikes every day”.

The news on aid from the Syrian regime. The online newspaper Al Watan Syria reports that “| Fraternal and friendly countries have sent their planes loaded with aid to help those affected and others are arriving today. Condolence messages have reached President Bashar Al-Assad together with confirmation of their willingness to help the populations hit by the earthquake” . From the Damascus news outlet we learn that there is a “continuous landing of relief supplies for the Syrians with planes landed at Lattakia airport: 5 Russian cargo, loaded with food and relief supplies, together with technical crews and technological equipment which helped identify places where people were trapped under the rubble.Also yesterday, another Iranian rescue plane arrived in Lattakia and yet another at Aleppo airport, where four Algerian planes landed, plus to a Syrian Arab Airlines cargo plane from Libya.Another Emirati relief cargo landed at Damascus International Airport.