INSTITUT KURD E DE PARIS Information and liaison bulletin N° 401 AUGUST 2018 The publication of this Bulletin enjoys a subsidy from the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs & Ministry of Culture This bulletin is issued in French and English Price per issue : France: 6 € — Abroad : 7,5 € Annual subscribtion (12 issues) France : 60 € — Elsewhere : 75 € Monthly review Directeur de la publication : Mohamad HASSAN Misen en page et maquette : Ṣerefettin ISBN 0761 1285 INSTITUT KURDE, 106, rue La Fayette - 75010 PARIS Tel. : 01-48 24 64 64 - Fax : 01-48 24 64 66 www.fikp.org E-mail: bulletin@fikp.org Information and liaison bulletin Kurdish Institute of Paris Bulletin N° 401 August 2018 • ROJAVA: NEW PROOFS OF TURKISH ABUSES AT AFRIN, ROJAVA-DAMASCUS DISCUSSIONS ARE CONTINUING • TURKEY: ERDOGAN’S POLICY INCREASES STILL FURTHER THE COUNTRY’S ISOLATION • IRAQ: CONFIRMATION OF THE ELECTION RESULTS; POST-ELECTION BARGAINING STILL CONTINUING — AS IS ARABISATION… • IRAN: MILITARY TENSIONS AND UNCEASING REPRESSION IN KURDISTAN • SCIENCE AND CULTURE: A KURDISH REFUGEE FROM IRAN RECEIVES THE HIGHEST DISTINC - TION IN MATHEMATICS ROJAVA: NEW PROOFS OF TURKISH ABUSES AT AFRIN, ROJAVA-DAMASCUS DISCUSSIONS ARE CONTINUING While the Turkish ing Turkey in a report, issued on distinct enquiry of its own, the troops and their Syrian 2nd August, denouncing the intol - Syrian Centre for Human Rights auxiliaries still occupy erable situation created by the (SCHR) report about 1,000 people W the Afrin region and occupation forces for the inhabi - arrested by various groups of several international tants of Afrin. The latter “suffer rebels since the invasion. Basing agencies and organisations contin - many repeated attacks on their themselves on dozens of witnesses ue to denounce the violations of Human Rights committed by the 2 reports draw a picture of a Human Rights that the occupiers Syrian groups armed and situation of anarchy and impunity. are committing, the Syrian Kurds equipped by Turkey. (…) These continue their sensitive discus - breaches, to which the Turkish According to the ANF news agen - sions with the Damascus regime, armed forces shut their eyes, cy, the Yezidis are particularly tar - which is preparing to regain the include arbitrary detention, forced geted by the Jihadists, who try to Idlib region, just South of Afrin. disappearances, the confiscation of convert them forcibly and oblige The perspective of a battle for property and plundering”. UNO them to send their children to the Idlib, as that of the Kurds and demanded that Ankara, as the mosque and to attend courses on Damascus drawing closer, cannot “occupying power”, and thus religion. Those who refuse can be fail to worry Ankara … responsible for the security of the tortured and their protesting used residents, maintain order in Afrin as grounds for arrest as happened After UNO, it is now Amnesty and “put an end to these viola - in the week of the 13 th in the vil - International that is directly accus - tions without delay” ( AFP ). In a lages of Kurzele (Sherawa dis - • 2 • Information and liaison bulletin n° 401 • August 2018 trict), Qestal Kishk (Shera district) emanating from the SDF, reacted fighters of the “Free Syrian Army” and at Rajo, in the Afrin region, to these accusations by denounc - (Al-Masdar ). On the 5 th , a video of where about twenty Kurds have ing some possible “irresponsible the execution of a Kurd, Akash been incarcerated. Abuses regard - individual abuses” that in no way Haji Ahmed, was shown on line. ing property, especially olive trees, represented the “SCD overall Having served as an informant for the most important source of strategy”. It promised that if these the Turkish Army, “a member of wealth in Afrin, are being contin - facts turned out to be true to the traitors committee set up by ued, especially at Rajo, where the “restore the children to their fami - the Turkish occupation authorities Jihadists again burned down trees. lies and bring those responsible to in the village of Deir Swan”, he account”. In 2017 UNO had also sent to displaced people In parallel to this, Turkey organis - recorded 22 cases of recruiting threatening SMS messages to dis - es the annexation of conquered children in YPG women’s section, suade them from returning. A areas by setting up a network of five times more than the year group calling itself Operation Olive roads ( Al-Monitor , 27/08). The first before. Moreover, in a letter dated Wrath claimed his execution in a new road, linking al-Bab to al-Ray, 16 July and published on the 3 rd declaration confirmed neither by was completed at the end of July on the HRW site, the PYD the YPG nor the PYD. On the con - and a motorway connecting Azaz, explained that in certain cases the trary, after the group had warned at the border, to Mare, North of children had been taken away the inhabitants of Afrin to “stay Aleppo is under way. Another will from the camps for their own pro - away from the places where the reach the town of Jerablous, con - tection, like the little girl of less mercenaries are settling” in case of trolled by the Turks. This network than 12 from the Al-Arisha camp, fresh attacks and, after a bomb will make easier the deployment who had been raped and made had caused on the 21 st 3 civilians’ of troops but also the entry of pregnant, whose family wanted to deaths in Afrin, the YPG denied Turkish goods… Are Syrian areas kill her because of her pregnancy, any involvement in the latter, under Turkish control due to suf - and who asked herself the YPJ accusing the Turkish Secret fer the fate of North Cyprus? fighters for protection. Her family, Service. Meanwhile on the 14 th Children at school are already who accused them of having they published an assessment cov - learning Turkish and a “National forcibly enrolled her, had evident - ering the second week of August Army” commanded from Ankara ly not mentioned these facts… in which they claimed the deaths is coming into existence. The state - in 2 separate attacks of several ment of one of its officers speaks All through the month resistance Syrian fighters and some Turkish volumes about its “discipline” — to the occupation of Afrin contin - soldiers and dozens others he had to order his men to “stop ued. On 1 st August the YPG pub - wounded ( Al-Masdar ). On the 20 th opening fire at random”! lished a video showing the execu - the execution was announced of a (Challenges , Reuters , 12/08). On the tion of one of the Islamist leaders high-ranking commander of the 29 th the SCHR reported internal and claimed the attack on the HQ Jabhat Al-Shamiyah , Mohammad fighting between Jihadist militia at of the Sultan Mourad Brigade on Mahhou, in the night of the 18 th in Jerablous, and at Idlib, the chaos 28 th July in the Shara district, in an ambush. took the form of explosions and which 2 fighters were killed and kidnappings while Hayat Tahrir al- another one wounded. On the 3 rd On the 26 th , the YPG claimed 2 Sham , former Al-Nusra Front, a fresh assessment was made of others ambushes in which 3 rebel Syrian branch of Al-Qaeda , hunts the deaths in attack of at least 9 chiefs lost their lives. The first, on down anyone suspected of help - rebels killed between 29 July and the 19 th , was on the Mabata main ing Damascus or ISIS ( Xinhua ). 2nd August, as well as an attack road and killed one of the Jabhat using a booby-trapped motorbike al-Shamiya mercenaries, Another Human Rights defence at Basutah, in the Sherawa district, Muhammad Ardwan. In the sec - NGO, Human Rights Watch (HRW), where a Turkish soldier and 4 ond operation it was a member of went public on 3 rd August and mercenaries were killed and 3 oth - the Faylaq al-Sham group, Abu accused the Kurdish Peoples’ ers seriously wounded. On the 2 nd Muhammad al-Shamali, responsi - Protection Units (YPG), the mili - another Turkish soldier and 3 ter - ble for setting up the control posts tary wing of the PYD and the rorists were killed, and two others in the Bulbul district roads, who spinal column of the Syrian wounded in an ambush against a was killed on the 24 th . On the 30 th Democratic Forces (SDF) fighting jeep. On the 4 th a YPG assessment the YPG declared they had killed ISIS, of recruiting children in the covering the whole of July count - the day before near Afrin, in a displaced persons camps ( AFP ). ed 54 occupation forces killed bomb attack, the military chief of On the 5 th the Syrian Democratic including 23 Turkish troops, 2 cap - the Faylaq al-Sham group, Khaled Council (SDC), the political entity tains and 1 lieutenant, plus 31 Obeid and 18 other fighters. n° 401 • August 2018 Information and liaison bulletin • 3• According to the SCHR, YPG units could still last another two to three ing Raqqa and Hasakah to killed at least 108 rebels and months ( AFP ). On the evening of Damascus, and defended the idea Turkish soldiers since March mars the 17 th the SDF repelled a jihadist of a “decentralised” Syria, adding (Kurdistan-24 ). On the 31 st , 2 attack on the buildings that shel - that it was just the centralisation Turkish troops and 2 Syrian fight - tered America and French troops. that had caused the present crisis ers of the al-Hamza division were This was to the East of Deir Ezzor (al-Masdar ). On the 12 th another killed near Barbana village (Rajo) Province, on the Omar oil fields, member of the SDC, Hesen Eli, in an attack on a control post, one of the largest in Syria.