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Category: Syria

‘Turkey shot self in foot with its hostile anti-Syria policy’

The leader of Turkey’s main opposition party Kemal Kilicdaroglu says that Ankara has shot itself in the foot with its hostile anti-Syria policy.

Kemal Kilicdaroglu, leader of the main Turkish opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP)

During a speech in the southern city of Adana, the leader of the Republican People’s Party (CHP) condemned Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s stance towards Damascus.

Kilicdaroglu accused Erdogan of siding with Saudi Arabia and Qatar against the Syrian government of Bashar al-Assad.

He said that the Turkish government’s stance towards Syria is not in line with his country’s national interests, but instead serves that of the US, Germany, and France.

The opposition leader further warned Ankara against anti-Syria policies by saying that they would leave Turkey isolated in the region. He said Turkey should focus on gaining allies in the region instead of turning them away.

Qatar has recently allowed the Syrian opposition to open an embassy in its capital Doha. This is while the original Syrian embassy in Doha remains closed.

In February, Kilicdaroglu criticized Erdogan’s policy regarding Syria, calling it a “grave mistake.” He also said that as a result of Ankara’s financial and military support for the Syrian opposition, increasing numbers of Syrian people were losing their lives.

Protests have been held in Turkey against the government’s anti-Syria policies over the past months.

Syria has been experiencing unrest since March 2011. Many people, including large numbers of Army and security personnel, have been killed in the violence.

The Syrian government has said that the chaos is being orchestrated from outside the country, and that a very large number of the militants operating in the country are foreign nationals.

Several international human rights organizations have accused foreign-sponsored militants of committing war crimes.

SZH/HN

via PressTV – ‘Turkey shot self in foot with its hostile anti-Syria policy’.

March 31, 2013
Syria refugee crisis: One million and counting

Syria refugee crisis: One million and counting

Beirut, 24 days ago

One million people have fled Syria’s civil war, piling pressure on the country’s neighbours who are struggling to support them, the United Nations refugee agency said on Wednesday.

Around half the refugees are children, most of them aged under 11, and the numbers leaving are mounting every week, UNHCR added.

“With a million people in flight, millions more displaced internally, and thousands of people continuing to cross the border every day, Syria is spiralling towards full-scale disaster,” UN High Commissioner for Refugees António Guterres said in a statement.

“We are doing everything we can to help, but the international humanitarian response capacity is dangerously stretched. This tragedy has to be stopped.”

Nearly two years ago, Syrians started trickling out of the country when President Bashar al-Assad’s forces started shooting at pro-democracy protests.

The uprising has since turned into an increasingly sectarian struggle between armed rebels and government soldiers and militias. An estimated 70,000 people have been killed.

UNHCR said the number of Syrians quitting their country has increased dramatically since the beginning of the year with more than 400,000 – nearly half the total figure – since January 1.

They arrive traumatised, without possessions and having lost members of their families, it added.

Most have fled to Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, Iraq and Egypt and some arrive in North Africa and Europe.

Lebanon – the country closest to Syria’s embattled capital of Damascus – is the smallest of the country’s neighbours but has received the most refugees.

Including Syrian workers and self-supporting Syrian families, one in five people in Lebanon is now Syrian.

Refugee flows into Lebanon have doubled to 4,400 a day in the past three weeks, UNHCR representative in Lebanon Ninette Kelley told Reuters in an interview.

But despite pledges of $1.5 billion by international donors for a U.N. response plan to help Syria’s displaced, only 25 per cent has been funded, UNHCR said.

In Jordan, energy, water, health and education services are being strained to the limit, the agency added. Turkey has spent more than $600 million setting up 17 refugee camps, with more under construction.

There is no end in sight for Syria’s civil war and international powers are divided over how to respond to it. Russia and Shi’ite Iran support their historical ally Assad while the United States and Sunni Muslim Gulf countries back the opposition.

Both Damascus and the opposition have said they will consider peace talks but no meetings have been arranged. – Reuters

via Syria refugee crisis: One million and counting.

March 31, 2013
Al-Jaafari: Syria opposes the current text of the Arms’ Trade Treaty

Syria’s Permanent Representative to the UN Dr. Bashar al-Jaafari said that Syria has sought and will seek the legislation of arms trade due to the risk posed by illicit arms trade on international security and peace.

During the closing session of the UN conference on the arms trade treaty, al-Jaafari said that Syria opposes the current text of the treaty as it doesn’t address foreign occupation, the right to self-determination of people under occupation, and the crimes of aggression, in addition to not having a clear article on the absolute ban of providing weapons to terrorist elements and groups.

Al-Jaafari pointed out that Syria exerted big efforts to bring the delegations’ different points of view together to reach an unanimously draft of the arms trade treaty as the mission was not easy due to the deep differences among the member states.

He said ” My country’s delegation worked hard to reach an agreement that preserves the rights of all the countries and tried to approximate the points of view through holding several meetings with a number of delegations and through proposing a number of essential points which we want that the treaty to include as it becomes balanced.”

He added “My country opposes the current text of the treaty for the coming reasons:

First: The treaty ignored the proposals of a number of countries including Syria on the inclusion of a reference in the text to the foreign occupation and the inalienable rights of the people under the foreign occupation to self-determination, as the Israeli occupation still occupies Arab territories in the Syrian Golan, Palestine and Lebanon.

Second :The selectivity and transparency in the supervising procedures on armament don’t constitute a balanced and overall approach as it hinders the international community of committing to disarmament.

Third: the current teary is an interference in the Security Council’s affairs.

Fourth: The treaty is not unanimous as it doesn’t take into consideration the stances and views of a number of countries, among them Syria.

Fifth: The text doesn’t include a frank paragraph on the categorically ban of supplying weapons to the armed terrorist groups and members.

Al-Jaafari asserted that ignoring this dangerous issue which my country is suffering from due to providing the armed terrorist groups with arms by some countries is completely unacceptable by Syria as it is considered a flagrant violation of the international principles and charters with the aim of liquidating any hope of a political and peaceful solution to the crisis in Syria, based on the UN Security Council resolutions No. 2042 and 2043.

Sixth: The treaty ignored the identification section to tackle some ambiguity on some idioms which have been mentioned in the treaty.

Seventh: the text ignored an important issue that is the aggression crime which is unanimously identified and agreed on by the international community based on the UN General Secretariat Resolutions No. 3314 for 1974.

Al-Jaafari stressed that the objection of one delegation on the draft means that there is no consensus, adding that “We support consensus on a good treaty, not on an inapplicable treaty which would be used in the future to put pressures on some countries.

via Al-Jaafari: Syria opposes the current text of the Arms’ Trade Treaty.

March 31, 2013
Syrian Financial Capital’s Loss Is Turkey’s Gain

Syrian refugees are pictured at Kilis refugee camp in Gaziantep, Turkey, on Nov. 1. An estimated 150,000 Syrians are reported to be living in the Turkish border town.

Maurizio Gambarini/DPA/Landov

There is a brain drain in Syria, an exodus of the skilled and the educated as the Syrian revolt grinds into a third year.

The health care system is one casualty, as hospitals and clinics are shelled and doctors flee the country.

The business community is another — particularly in Aleppo, Syria’s largest city and once the country’s industrial and financial hub.

As Aleppo was dragged into the war, many in the business community fled to southern Turkey, less than a two-hour drive away. Gaziantep, a Turkish border town, has become a new hub for Syrian businessmen.

At the recent opening of a new restaurant in Gaziantep, the excitement among Syrian exiles was all about the white creamy sauce served with the spicy chicken.

Syrians flocked to the recent opening of a new restaurant in Gaziantep serving a creamy garlic sauce known as creme toum. It’s a sign that some Syrians are beginning to think about Gaziantep as more than just a temporary home.

Deborah Amos/NPR

“Garlic, very important with chicken,” insisted customer Ahmad Showah, who has longed for Syrian cuisine since he came to Turkey seven months ago. For him, the traditional Syrian sauce was part nostalgia, part identity — a powerful reminder of home.

“Garlic, eggs, oil and spices,” said restaurant owner Mohamad Serjeh, listing the ingredients of Syria’s “special” sauce as he piled plates with crispy chicken. Serjeh brought his stainless steel chicken roasters from his ruined shop in Aleppo and opened the first Syrian restaurant in this Turkish border town.

More than 150,000 Syrians now live in Gaziantep, with more arriving. So Serjeh had a full house on opening day.

“There are about 17,000 Syrians here who have the wherewithal to buy this kind of food,” Serjeh said, “so we hope for a good success.”

That’s his rough calculation of Syrian exiles with means in just one Turkish town. Official data from the Turkish banking agency shows that Syrians have deposited almost $4 billion in Turkish banks — some of the cash transferred across the border on the backs of mules, packed by Syrians in a hurry to get money out. As the war has intensified, more than 400 factories have shut down.

Fuad Barazi is among the latest arrivals in Gaziantep. He owned a furniture store, a once-prosperous family business, in Aleppo. Barazi stayed as long as he could, caring for his elderly parents while delivering humanitarian aid. But a few weeks ago, he decided he had to get out of Aleppo.

“Last few months, it was devastating — horrible, actually. The bombs very near to us, power, no water. Also, and I have a sick dad, so I had to come,” Barazi said.

For the moment, he and his family are recovering from their ordeal, and not thinking of how long to stay in Turkey. But Barazi and others like him from Syria’s business elite are wondering when they can go back and rebuild the country’s economy — and, more broadly, what kind of country will Syria become.

The answers will determine Syria’s recovery, said Soli Ozul, a Turkish political commentator.

“When the best leave, then you end up with the brutes,” Ozul said. “I just don’t know how much of that elite went out and how many of them will want to return after, at least, there is a regime change.”

For now, Aleppo’s loss is Turkey’s economic gain, certainly in Gaziantep, a city with historical links to Syria. In Ottoman times, Gaziantep was part of Aleppo province.

And once again, the Turkish border city is intertwined with Syria. The Sanko Park mall was built a few years ago to cater to Syrians who easily crossed the border to shop on weekends. Now, more than 30,000 Syrian businessmen have come to Turkey to escape the war — attracted by government policies that allow them to open factories and offices and make lucrative deals, said Barazi, the furniture store owner.

Can Aleppo recover if the business community stays in Gaziantep?

“I guess not, because the businessman plays a major role in Aleppo,” Barazi said. “Aleppo will not survive without the businessmen.”

But even Barazi can’t say yet whether he will go back to rebuild what was once Syria’s financial capital.

March 30, 2013
UN rebukes Turkey over return of Syrian refugees

Witnesses say hundreds of Syrians bussed to border after clashes between refugees, Turkish military police at Suleymansah camp.

Syrian refugees in Turkey Photo: reuters

GENEVA – The UN refugee agency criticized Turkey on Friday for sending home at least 130 Syrians without its scrutiny and urged it to investigate the riot which sparked the departures that some witnesses said were forced.

Turkey denied on Thursday it had rounded up and deported hundreds of Syrian refugees following unrest at the Suleymansah border camp, highlighting the strain the exodus from Syria’s civil war is placing on neighboring states.

The Geneva-based United Nations agency reiterated the principle that forced returns violate international law and said they could not be used as a “punishment or deterrent”.

“UNHCR was not invited by authorities during the return process to monitor the procedures. Persons under international protection who have violated the law of the host country are subject to the relevant national laws and judicial procedures,” Melissa Fleming, chief spokeswoman of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, said in remarks emailed to Reuters overnight.

“Return to the country of origin, even voluntarily, is also subject to standards and procedures where individuals may be placed at risk on return,” she said.

The refugees returned to areas of northern Syria held by rebels fighting President Bashar Assad. UNHCR has no direct access to the area and does not know what happened to them.

Two Syrian refugees still in the camp and a camp official have said the refugees were forcibly deported. Turkish media reports said the protest began after a boy died in a tent fire blamed on an electrical fault.

Witnesses said hundreds of Syrians were bussed to the border after clashes on Wednesday in which refugees in the Suleymansah camp, near the Turkish town of Akcakale, threw rocks at military police, who fired teargas and water cannon.

“UNHCR would encourage authorities to assess any underlying issues which may have led to the incident which erupted in the Akcakale camp on 27 March, and where necessary to consider launching a review or as needed an investigation,” Fleming said.

Turkey’s Foreign Ministry said 130 people, identified on camera as being “involved in the provocations”, returned to Syria voluntarily, either because they did not want to face prosecution or because of repercussions from other refugees.

“Reports that this group was expelled across the border are incorrect,” a Foreign Ministry statement said.

“As required by the temporary protection status and within the framework of the ‘open door’ and ‘non-refoulement’ principle, our country does not turn back Syrians wanting to come to Turkey or forcibly evict those in our country,” it said.

More than 1.2 million Syrians fleeing violence and persecution have registered as refugees or await processing in neighboring countries and North Africa, the UNHCR says. They include 261,635 in Turkey, mostly staying in 17 camps.

The UNHCR noted “the high standard of assistance and protection extended to Syrians hosted in Turkey” and commended its government and people “for their ongoing generosity and sheltering of those in need”, Fleming said

via UN rebukes Turkey over return of Syrian refugees | JPost | Israel News.

March 30, 2013
Turkey deports 600 Syrian refugees following protest over living conditions, official says

Turkish FM denies reports of forced evacuations, says 50-60 Syrians returned voluntarily; UNHCR reports riots in Jordan refugee camp.

By Reuters and The Associated Press

Syrian refugees make their way in flooded water at a temporary refugee camp, in the eastern Lebanese town of Al-Faour near the border with Syria, January 8, 2013. Photo by AP

Turkey deported at least 600 Syrians staying at a refugee camp near the border after they clashed with Turkish military police in a protest over living conditions, a Turkish official said on Thursday in remarks disputed by the country’s foreign ministry.

“These people were involved in Wednesday’s violence, they were seen by the security cameras in the camp,” an official in the camp told Reuters by telephone. “Between 600 and 700 have been deported. The security forces are still looking at the footage, and if they see more they will deport them.”

Turkey’s foreign ministry, however, denies forcibly deporting the Syrians and said about 50-60 had returned to Syria voluntarily.

“Some people have returned since last night, the numbers are closer to 50 or 60, and yes some of these may have been involved in the provocations from Wednesday but they returned of their own free will,” foreign ministry spokesman Levent Gumrukcu said on Thursday.

The United Nations refugee agency voiced deep concern on at the reports of mass deportations of Syrians from Turkey and said it had taken up the issue with Turkish authorities.[1]

“UNHCR is very concerned with reports of a serious incident and allegations of possible deportations from Akcakale Tent City in the past 24 hours,” Melissa Fleming, chief spokeswoman of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), told Reuters.

Meanwhile, the UN refugee agency is reporting that a riot broke out at a refugee camp for Syrians in Jordan after some of the refugees were told they could not return home.

Ali Bibi, a UNHCR liaison officer in Jordan, says it’s unclear how many refugees were involved in Thursday’s melee at the Zaatari camp. The riot broke out after some Syrians in the camp tried to board buses to go back to their country.

He says Jordanian authorities refused to let the buses head to the border because of ongoing clashes between the rebels and President Bashar Assad’s forces in southern Syria, just across the border from Jordan.

Bibi says there were no immediate reports of injuries. He says Jordanian authorities promised to organize the refugees’ return home at another time.

In Damascus, activists say Syrian rebels are attacking army checkpoints in and around a key southern town that is a gateway to the capital. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says rebel attacks are under way in Dael and surrounding areas.

The Local Coordination Committees, another activists group, says regime bombardment of Dael killed at least three people on Thursday. Dael lies in the strategic Daraa province, which borders Jordan.The fighting comes as Mideast powers opposed to President Bashar Assad have stepped up weapons supplies to Syrian rebels in coordination with the U.S. in preparation for a push on the Syrian capital.

That’s according to officials and military experts who spoke to the Associated Press in Jordan. The UN says Syria’s two-year civil war has killed more than 70,000 people.

via Turkey deports 600 Syrian refugees following protest over living conditions, official says – Middle East – Israel News | Haaretz Daily Newspaper.

March 29, 2013