During looting operations | Regime soldiers injured in explosion of old landmine in farmland in rural Idlib
Idlib province: SOHR sources have documented the injury of four regime soldiers in the explosion of an old landmine in a farmland nearby Maarshmarin town in the southern countryside of Idlib. It is worth noting that regime forces were looting crops in the town when the explosion took place.
According to SOHR sources, regime forces and their proxies allowed investors to harvest wheat and barley in the past few days, where they opened the branch of the Syrian institution for receiving the harvest for 1,700 SYP per ton plus a reward of 300 SYP. The production of wheat and barley in Idlib countryside is estimated to be 50,000 ton of wheat and the same amount of barley.
In mid-May, SOHR sources reported that since regime forces and their proxy militias captured areas of Aleppo, Hama and Idlib during the large-scale military campaign in 2019 and 2020, these forces looted contents of houses of civilians who have been forced to displace due to the fierce battles. Recently, these areas experienced the theft of steel and iron used in construction of houses via investors who are protected by regime-backed military formations with the aim of selling this iron in markets later.
Local sources informed SOHR that regime forces continued to destroy the roofs of civilian houses to extract these steel and iron, where they sell large amounts in Hama city’s markets, while the looting takes place by influential investors close to the Syrian regime and with cooperation with the regime and Russian-backed 25th Division, headed by the Brigadier General Suhail Al-Hassan.
Local sources also confirmed that the looting operations expanded greatly in the past few days, where these investors exploited the relative calm in term of exchange of bombardment between regime forces on one hand, and opposition rebel factions and jihadist groups on the other. According to the local sources, hundreds of houses were looted last winter in several villages and towns in Idlib countryside, including Sarqeb, Khan Shaykhoun Al-Ghadfah, Maarshourin, Jarjnaz, Al-Haraki and Tel Mannas.
The local sources also confirmed that devastation of houses’ roofs and extraction of iron used in construction of houses were carried out systematically through official investment contracts, where no one was allowed to head to these areas and start the demolition of houses, unless they had such contracts.