In protest against the continuous violations, abductions, and detentions, 2 demonstrations in Afrin city against the factions, demanding Turkey held them accountable and stop their violations
Afrin city which is controlled by “Olive branch” Operation and the Turkish Forces; witnessed in the past 24 hours two separate demonstrations, along with calls for a third one today, on Sunday, the 3rd of June 2018, where the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitored tens of young men protesting at Azadi Square in Afrin city, demanding the release of a media activist who was kidnapped by parties control the city, where the youths accused al-Hamzah Division of kidnapped him and taking him to one of detentions of the division which operates in “Olive Branch” operation, because the media activist has been harassed recently by members of Hamzah Division, amid calls from the young protesters for demonstrations today, Sunday, if the fate of the activist has not been revealed and released.
In the same context, tens of the citizens of Afrin city carried out a demonstration in Mahmudiya area in the city, during which they called on the Turkish forces -who are present in the city- to put an end for the violations of the factions of “Olive Branch” Operation as well as the rebel and Islamic factions in the city, which are repeated daily at an escalating pace, as a result of the lack of accountability for those members who loot the citizens and their property and insult them, and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights obtained information confirming that the second demonstration in al-Mahmudiya area came after an attack by members from al-Hamzah Division on one of owners of electricity generators in the city, where they assaulted and insulted him, because the owner demanded one of the members of al-Hamzah Division to pay his accumulated dues due to his electricity subscription through the owners’ generator.
A few days earlier, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights published that local sources confirmed to the Syrian Observatory that the factions of the Operation “Olive Branch” which are located in Afrin area, are still continuing to loot and thieve the property of the citizens, and the residents confirmed that factions have imposed royalties on the owners and farmers of the agricultural lands and farms in Afrin area, while they burn the crops of those who refuse to pay the royalties, the SOHR also learned from intersected sources, that tens of vehicles have returned from the contact lines between the controlled areas of the Turkish forces and the forces of the “Olive Branch” Operation, and the regime’s controlled areas and the controlled areas of the Kurdish forces in the northern countryside of Aleppo, as a result of preventing the citizens by the factions and Turkish authorities from returning to Afrin area.
The sources confirmed that this prevention is accompanied by fears by the citizens from entering the area, after the arrests which were carried out against the citizens of those who were allowed by the Turkish authorities to enter the area, while hundreds of citizens disappointedly turned back, after they had prevented from returning to their houses and villages which were seized and became under the control of the factions and the Turkish forces, while hundreds of thousands of citizens who are located in the northern countryside of Aleppo, are still suffering from the deteriorating human and living situations, in conjunction with the bad weather, where the humanitarian organizations are still turning their backs to the calls for help and the cries of children, women and elderly people, amid the International Community’s ignore to this tragedy of hundreds of thousands of people who have been displaced from their villages, towns and houses.
And the Syrian Observatory published few days ago, that it monitored the Syrian opposition of the “Olive Branch” operation arresting tens of citizens in Afrin city And its countryside in the northwest sector of Aleppo province, where the people accused the factions working in Afrin area of taking the arrest as a trade, by bringing the citizens to detention centers and forcing their relatives to pay a ransom in exchange for releasing them, after beating and torturing them, also the factions interrogate the families returning to Afrin area, about their association with the Democratic Union Party and the Kurdish Forces, and the Syrian Observatory monitored few days ago, a shy return of the displaced people of Afrin, where displaced families in the northern countryside of Aleppo were able to return to Afrin area, after being allowed by the checkpoints of factions and the Turkish Forces to return to the area, sources told the Syrian Observatory that the numbers of returnees is considered too small compared to hundreds of thousands of who have been displaced from Afrin and its countryside, and the returning families are being subjected to investigation about the existence of family members who are enrolled in the Self-Defense duty, and whether they were joined voluntarily or are forced to do so, as well as their partisan and political connection with the Democratic Union Party and Kurdish Forces.