The Syrian Observatory For Human Rights

Southern Aleppo countryside | Security and military committee in Aleppo announces auction to cultivate some 350 hectares

The head of the security and military committee in Aleppo issued an administrative order to hold an auction for cultivating undeveloped land in 11 villages in the southern Aleppo countryside with wheat crop for one season, according to the resolution of which the Syrian Observatory obtained a copy.

The resolution covered 3,413 donums, equivalent to 350 hectares of agricultural land in Jab Kas, Rasim al-Iss, Kosnia, Banas, Talafih, Hwier Al-Iss, Tal Mamu, Tal Bajir, Khalsa, al-Othmaniya and Zitan.

In Idlib, the regime’s agricultural association auctioned off all agricultural land, whose owners do not live in the regime-held areas in all villages and towns from Khan Sheikhoun to Saraqeb to rural Abu Al-Duhur.

Agricultural lands in Hama countryside are still under the control of regime-backed militamen, investing in it and cutting its wood, in addition to stealing all the property there.

Last July, Reliable SOHR sources reported that “Al-Baath party” branch in Mahradah has looted farmlands and the harvest of pistachio in Kafr Zita city in the northern countryside of Hama. The owners and inhabitants of these lands have abandoned them with the start of the recent military operations by Russian and regime forces last year.

According to SOHR sources, “Al-Baath party” branch in Mahrada intends to allocate the revenues of the pistachio harvest for the families of regime soldiers and loyalists who have been killed in earlier operations.

This decision comes as part of the “ruling party” efforts to strip the oppositionists of the right of usufruct, rent revenue, and sharecropping, and give them to regime soldiers, loyalists and Shabiha (regime loyalists who abuse power and do illegal actions for the benefit of the regime). SOHR believes that such practices will create never-ending rivalry and revenge among people each others.

On October 3, 2019, SOHR sources reported that leadership of “Al-Baath party” branch in Soran issued a publication to “Al-Baath party” branch in Kawkab village in the northern countryside of Hama, demanding it “work on counting lands, both agricultural or non-agricultural, belonging to terrorists, rebels, terrorist supporters, people who had left the area, and people whose fat were unknown.

The publication also notified Kawkab branch to provide the leadership of Soran branch with the required as quickly as possible in accordance with detailed tables with the necessary information, including (the name of the landowner and his status, location of the land, land’s area, type of land, being agricultural/non-agricultural), so that the leadership of Soran branch would communicate with the concerned authorities and invest the lands in favor of supporting families of the “martyrs” in accordance with rules and laws.”

It worth noting that the user’s rights are protected in accordance with provisions of the Land Reform Act and the Civil Law, considering them as a right of usufruct under the protection of provisions of ownership, the law No. 61 of 2004, which stipulates that “the person who benefits from a state land (agricultural reform of private state property) is considered the owner of the land from the date of accepting the distribution of the land by the accreditation committee in the province.

The land to be registered in the name of the person who reform it in real estate records at the request of the competent Directorate of Agriculture and Agrarian Reform. Accordingly, these lands have become in the possession of their owners even if they do not register them in the real estate records, and therefore any aggression on this property is against the “Constitution and law”.