Vandalism | HTS members dismantle industrial facilities and steal civilians’ property near Saraqeb city

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights has monitored this evening workshops belonging to HTS dismantling industrial equipment and the metal cladding of industrial facilities in the area near frontlines with regime forces on the Saraqeb-Idlib road.

Meanwhile, members of HTS also stole the equipment of a poultry located in the village of Ma’arat Ma’alaya, west of Saraqeb, and concrete saws in the same area.

HTS has dismantled the zinc sheets of the industrial facilities near frontlines in order to sell them as scrap metal in Idlib markets, preventing civilians from approaching these areas for being a military zone and targeted by regime forces.

Last year, Syrian Observatory activists reported seeing trucks carrying metal irrigation pipelines, and heavy diggers affiliated to Hayyaat Tahrir Al-Sham stealing other lines, near Qaston Dam in Sahl Al-Ghab in north-western Hama.

HTS had dismantled railway in several areas in Idlib countryside, as well as dismantling of a metal bridge near the town of Bdama in western countryside of Idlib.

The factions are used to stealing such objects to extract metal and steel pieces and sell them as scrap in areas under their control, while some other pieces are used in erecting barriers near Aleppo-Latakia international highway.

SOHR had reported that HTS members demolished public properties, south of Aleppo-Latakia highway, for selling the steel they extract form the ruins.

For doing such work, HTS exploited the poor unemployed young people in return for inconsiderable wages. Several buildings have been already destroyed in western Idlib near the administrative border with Hama province.

Reliable sources also informed the Syrian Observatory that HTS sold the equipment of the Zayzun thermal power plant, after offering what remained of it as scrap in a public auction in Idlib.