Shy return of displaced Afrin families to their homes and villages haunted by questioning and investigation with constant narrowing by the factions on who remained in Afrin
Between displacement, survival and return, the people of Afrin area are living in miserable conditions, some of which vary and others intersect, and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitored the continuation of tragedy for hundreds of thousands of displaced people due to the Operation “Olive Branch”, during which the Turkish forces and the Syrian opposition the rebel and Islamic factions were able to control the entire area of Afrin, after violent ashes and heavy shelling by artillery and rocket shells, and missiles believed to be ground-to-ground and bombardment of the warplanes and helicopter by missiles and barrel bombs, which caused Major destruction in Afrin area and killed some 300 civilians including tens of children and female citizens, where the displaced citizens are still living in tragic conditions, the provided services are declining, and the relief and humanitarian organizations turn a blind eye of the people who are in distress, they are tens of thousands of displaced people including children and female citizens.
Local sources reported to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights that treatment of the inhabitants and people of Afrin area differ from one area to another, where the treatment in Afrin city is subject to the authority of the Turkish military police, which is comparatively better than the countryside’s which –according to the locals– is subject to the mood of the factions, where the restrictions on the citizens vary from ab area to the other, depending on the faction that controls the area, and the Syrian Observatory’s intersected sources confirmed that the citizens are being narrowed on, and they are not allowed to leave their area except by an official permission of the area’s faction, sometimes they are prevented completely from exiting, with the continued raids on houses and arresting citizens on various charges and pretexts, where residents said that some factions are trying through the arrests to obtain money from the families of the detainees in order to be released.
In another context, 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, while reliable sources told the Syrian Observatory that some of the citizens who tried to return to Afrin in the past days were shot by members on a checkpoint of the Kurdish Units, which killed a young man and information about other wounded people, where that shooting took place during a demonstration called for the open of road to for them to return to their homes in Afrin area.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights published on the 11th of May 2018 that it has increased to 2500, the number of families which reached Afrin area controlled by the Turkish authorities and the “Euphrates Shield” Operation forces, and the intersected sources confirmed to the SOHR that more than 40% of the total number of people who have been resettled in Afrin, are families of fighters of the Eastern Ghouta’s factions, and the largest part is of families of Al-Rahman Corps’ fighters then of Jaysh Al-Islam, while the total number of families of the fighters of Ahrar Al-Sham Islamic movement of who have been resettled, does not exceed 50 families.
The sources also confirmed to the Syrian Observatory that the largest part of those who have been resettled in Afrin area, by the Turkish authorities, is of the families which have been displaced from the controlled areas of Al-Rahman Corps in Zamalka, Arbin and Jobar in the east of the capital Damascus and the south-western enclave of the Eastern Ghouta, according to the displacement deal between Al-Rahman Corps and Hayyaat Tahrir al-Sham on one hand, and the Russians and representatives of the regime on the other, while the resettlement process is still continuing, along with the tragic humanitarian situations of hundreds of thousands of displaced people of Afrin area, in the northern countryside of Aleppo, where those displaced people suffer from tragic humanitarian situations, deteriorating day after another, after the humanitarian organizations and the international concerned parties shut their eyes on those displaced people, and ignored their cries for help to reach a solution leads to their return to their houses which they have been displaced from.
Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitored the number of people who came out of each area, where the total number of people who got out of their areas to the Syrian north reached about 120100 displaced people from in the Eastern Ghouta, south Damascus, south Rif Dimashq, Eastern Qalamoun, northern countryside of Homs and southern countryside of Hama. The number of displaced people of the Eastern Ghouta reached about 68700 displaced people, followed by the displacement operation from central Syria -north Homs and south Hama- which included about 34500 displaced civilians, fighters and their families, followed by the south of Rif Dimashq by 9270 displaced persons, while about 1460 were displaced from al-Kadam neighborhood and part of al-Yarmouk Camp of fighters and civilians, while about 6240 civilians and fighters have been displaced from the Eastern Qalamoun, also hundreds of thousands of civilians remained in the areas where the displacements took place after accepting the “settlement with the regime” with a Russian guarantee, and in accordance with conditions that have been signed by the people.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitored the arrival of largest part of the displaced people to Afrin area, from which hundreds of thousands of its people have been displaced by “Olive Branch” operation, and tens of thousands of them have been resettled in houses of civilian and farms, and in camps in the southwestern countryside of Afrin, while the other part remained in the northern countryside of Aleppo and in Idlib Province, where some of them refused to be settled by the Turkish authorities and the factions in Afrin area, they also refused to live in homes where its people have been displaced, where the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitored over the past few days that the Turkish authorities resettled the displaced people of the Eastern Qalamoun and the Eastern Ghouta in Afrin area, after displacing hundreds of thousands of civilians out of it, by the military operation carried out by the Turkish Forces and the Syrian rebel and Islamic factions of the “Olive Branch” Operation, which was launched on the 20th of January 2018 until the 18th of March of the same year, where they completed on Sunday the 29th of April 2018, 6 weeks of controlling the entire area of Afrin, after an intense aerial and ground bombardment that left some 300 civilian casualties in addition to hundreds of wounded and also destroyed property of civilians, public facilities and infrastructure in the villages and towns of Afrin area and Afrin city, the SOHR also monitored the Turkish authorities operating in Afrin area taking the data of people entering Afrin area, particularly the displaced people of the Eastern Ghouta, where their fingerprints and eye prints of the inhabitants of the area are recorded, as well as the full information about them, amid strict procedures for those entering and exiting the area, in addition to stopping and inspecting inhabitants of the area and those who remained and refused to get out of it, where they were searched, scrutinized and interrogated during their movement on the checkpoints of Afrin areas.