A busi­ness in human lives has devel­oped in Afrin: harmed mili­tia demand­ing huge ran­soms for kid­napped civilians.


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Armed fac­tions backed by Turkey are pro­ceed­ing to sys­tem­at­ic arrests of ran­dom Kur­dish citizens.

The arrests tar­get both men and women who are some­times held against ran­som. Kid­nap­ping against ran­som has become a very pop­u­lar busi­ness with the fac­tions, aim­ing to col­lect as much mon­ey as pos­si­ble and to repress the pop­u­la­tion remain­ing in the towns in order to force them out of the region. The Syr­i­an Obser­va­to­ry for Human Rights (SOHR), based in Lon­don, has doc­u­ment­ed the fact that the fac­tions trans­ferred kid­napped per­sons into deten­tion cen­ters, seiz­ing their homes with some of them trans­formed into head­quar­ters for pro-Turk­ish fac­tions shar­ing the zones of influ­ence in Afrin.

Over 6 000 peo­ple have been kid­napped for ransom.

The Syr­i­an Obser­va­to­ry for Human Rights (SOHR) says it has doc­u­ment­ed at least 3 000 cas­es of kid­napped per­sons trans­ferred into “hostage quar­ters and secret jails” and that 2 090 of these kid­napped per­sons are still detained or report­ed as disappeared.

The detainees are tor­tured and beat­en, their rel­a­tives being pressed to pay for their liberation.

The kid­nap­pings have become “a way to make mon­ey” says the SOHR.

Sev­er­al of the vic­tims are trans­ferred to the infa­mous prison of Al-Raai or in Turkey itself.

On more than one occa­sion, the SOHR has not­ed that the fac­tions send the fam­i­lies audio or video clips of the kid­napped per­sons, blind­fold­ed and tor­tured under threat of a firearm, demand­ing an enor­mous ran­som imme­di­ate­ly, fail­ing which the hostages will be shot or decap­i­tat­ed. Per­sons already reduced to pover­ty have no oth­er choice than to call on their rel­a­tives and acquain­tances in order to scrape togeth­er the amounts demand­ed of them.

The ran­soms can reach $100 000. Often, as sev­er­al cas­es demon­strat­ed last May, sev­er­al mem­bers of the fam­i­ly, includ­ing chil­dren, are kid­napped and a ran­som is demand­ed against evi­dence of the tor­tured or mur­dered body of one of the victims.

Although vic­tims and their fam­i­lies in Afrin often sig­nal such cas­es to the mil­i­tary police, the civil­ian police and the Turk­ish author­i­ties, this has lit­tle effect”, accord­ing to the UN report.

The hor­ror of deten­tion centers

The deten­tion cen­ters are either homes con­fis­cat­ed from dis­placed Kurds, trans­formed into head­quar­ters for armed fac­tions, or pris­ons man­aged by the Turk­ish MIT and Grey Wolves, in Turk­men towns East of Azaz, such as the pris­ons of Sejjo and Al-Raii. Anoth­er large prison can be found in the bor­der vil­lage of Midan Akbaz, Rajo, in the extreme North of Afrin.

Detainees are inter­ro­gat­ed by armed groups and Turk­ish offi­cers. “All the ques­tion­ing relates to the detainees’ activ­i­ties on social media and accu­sa­tions of being affil­i­at­ed with the YPG/PKK/PYD”, explains Jan. H. who was detained three times in a row; every time, his fam­i­ly had to pay enor­mous sums for his liberation.

I was bru­tal­ly tor­tured and my father was arrest­ed when he was unable to pay the ran­som of $50 000. They called in my father and in front of him, they put a sword to my throat. I was only set free when my father man­aged to col­lect the ran­som mon­ey from our acquain­tances in Europe.”
There is clear evi­dence that some pris­on­ners were even impaled and have now dis­ap­peared. One sur­viv­ing per­son who was impaled and is now an invalid, received aid from smug­glers in order to enter Shah­ba (Gov­er­norate of Soueï­da, South Syria).

A look at the jails man­aged de fac­to by Turkey and the vio­lent carcer­al sys­tem of its agents, reveals inhu­mane tor­ture along with rapes and mur­ders, as indi­cat­ed in a series of phone inter­views with some thir­ty kid­napped per­sons in Afrin who described the cru­el con­di­tions inside these deten­tion cen­ters as crimes against humanity.

Accord­ing to the sur­vivors, the inter­roga­tors and tor­tur­ers spoke Turk­ish and Ara­bic and used a dozen dif­fer­ent tech­niques of torture.

Also as part of this dirty game, the women arrest­ed by the fac­tions were often sex­u­al­ly assault­ed and raped.

Civil­ians and civil­ian infra­struc­tures must be pro­tect­ed” has been the only alert to come out of the UN so far.

In view of these vio­la­tions of human rights, where oh where is the rest of humanity?

Rossel­la Assanti

Rossella Assanti

Rossella Assanti, activist and freelance journalist specialized in Kurdistan issues.
She believes in truth as a means of making justice win. Travel so that his pen becomes the voice of those who are silenced.

Image: Already in June 2019… A fam­i­ly, includ­ing a child with Down’s syn­drome, tak­en hostage, had been exe­cut­ed by armed groups.


Translation by Renée Lucie Bourges
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