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The dec­la­ra­tion of The Dis­placed Women of Afrin that our friend Gulis­tan Sido sent us from Roja­va. We pub­lish it in extenso.

To Mr. António Gutteres, Secretary-General of the United Nations.
To Mrs. Michelle Bachelet, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
To Mr. Paulo Pinheiro, chair of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic.

 

Videos and pho­tos of the series of crimes and vio­la­tions com­mit­ted by Turk­ish occu­pa­tion author­i­ties and armed groups loy­al to it affil­i­at­ed with what is called the “Syr­i­an Nation­al Army” in the Syr­i­an Kur­dish region of Afrin, recent­ly leaked by the mer­ce­nar­ies them­selves, revealed that these groups are hold­ing dozens of Kur­dish women in a mil­i­tary cen­ter and car­ry­ing out vio­lence against them.

This visu­al evi­dence is added to dozens of dai­ly reports and news about crimes and prac­tices car­ried out by armed groups under the instruc­tions of the Turk­ish occu­pa­tion author­i­ties, and it is an addi­tion­al con­fir­ma­tion of this ter­ror­is­tic behav­ior that has ruled the region since Turkey occu­pied it. These actions are out­side the realm of legal­i­ty and do not take into account the low­est con­sid­er­a­tions for human­i­ty and moral­i­ty, amid the shame­ful silence of inter­na­tion­al institutions.

These armed fac­tions are enti­ties that do not poss­es even the low­est lev­els of legal legit­i­ma­cy, and they are an instru­ment used by Ankara to occu­py Afrin and dis­place 80% of its orig­i­nal Kur­dish inhab­i­tants. The rest of these res­i­dents remain in a large prison in which they are sub­ject­ed to the impo­si­tion of fines, theft, impris­on­ment, tor­ture, kid­nap­ping, and murder.

The prac­tices of armed groups against Kur­dish women is a bla­tant vio­la­tion of all inter­na­tion­al­ly adopt­ed laws and social norms, and it dif­fers in no way from the prac­tices of ISIS in enslav­ing women, insult­ing their dig­ni­ty, and bru­tal­iz­ing them.

What is hap­pen­ing in Afrin vio­lates the nat­ur­al right of a human being to live, as well as a num­ber of inter­na­tion­al laws, including:

- The Uni­ver­sal Dec­la­ra­tion of Human Rights, which was adopt­ed inter­na­tion­al­ly in Paris on 10/12/1948 and stat­ed in its fifth arti­cle, “No one shall be sub­ject­ed to tor­ture or to cru­el, inhu­man or degrad­ing treat­ment or pun­ish­ment.” In Arti­cle Nine: “No one shall be sub­ject­ed to arbi­trary arrest, deten­tion or exile.” In Arti­cle Twelve: “No one shall be sub­ject­ed to arbi­trary inter­fer­ence with his pri­va­cy, fam­i­ly, home or cor­re­spon­dence, nor to attacks upon his hon­our and rep­u­ta­tion. Every­one has the right to the pro­tec­tion of the law against such inter­fer­ence or attacks.”

- Arti­cle Sev­en of the Rome Statute defines the impris­on­ment, tor­ture, enslave­ment, and assault of women and their hon­or as a crime against human­i­ty, pun­ish­able by inter­na­tion­al law.

- Arti­cle 27 of the Gene­va Con­ven­tion states that “pro­tect­ed per­sons are enti­tled, in all cir­cum­stances, to respect for their per­sons, their hon­or, their fam­i­ly rights, their reli­gious con­vic­tions and prac­tices, and their man­ners and cus­toms”. It con­tains arti­cles and pro­vi­sions pro­hibit­ing cru­el treat­ment and attacks on per­son­al dignity.

- Dec­la­ra­tion of the Unit­ed Nations Gen­er­al Assem­bly in 1974 con­cern­ing the pro­tec­tion of women and children.

- Prin­ci­ples of the (1993) Inter­na­tion­al Dec­la­ra­tion on the Elim­i­na­tion of Vio­lence against Women.

- Rec­om­men­da­tions in the CEDAW Con­ven­tion on the Sta­tus of Women.

For all the above men­tioned arti­cles, we demand the inter­na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty and the rel­e­vant inter­na­tion­al institutions:

  1. Take imme­di­ate action to end all vio­la­tions which have been occur­ring in Afrin for more than two years, and reveal the fate of the Kur­dish women in prison in the pris­ons and deten­tion cen­ters of the armed fac­tions loy­al to the Turk­ish occu­pa­tion and lib­er­ate them immediately.
  2. Form an inter­na­tion­al inves­ti­ga­to­ry com­mit­tee to pros­e­cute per­pe­tra­tors for the crimes they com­mit­ted, includ­ing mur­der, kid­nap­ping, and tor­ture of Kur­dish women in Afrin.
  3. Allow trust­ed media orga­ni­za­tions to enter Afrin region to impart objec­tive­ly and truth­ful­ly the bit­ter real­i­ty of the remain­ing indige­nous peo­ple in it.
  4. End the Turk­ish occu­pa­tion, expel the extrem­ist groups, and ensure a safe and dig­ni­fied return of dis­placed peo­ple to their lands.
  5. Clas­si­fy the armed groups con­trol­ling Afrin as ter­ror­ist groups, accord­ing to the behav­ior they practice.

The Dis­placed Women of Afrin
June 1, 2020

Video on Face­book : here

  • afrin

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