#kobani questions

[somethingclevermahogony]

An Introduction to Myself and My WIP!

Hello everyone! A confession, this is actually a re-introduction. I've been here on Tumblr for a little less than a year now, but I haven't been the best about being active, life just sort of got in the way. As such I would like to reintroduce myself and what I've been working on.

For the purposes of Tumblr and in the interest of privacy you can call me C. I am in my mid-twenties, I use he/him pronouns, and I am happily married to my partner, who is also a C. I am queer, as is my partner. I enjoy cooking, fishing, Dnd(ing?), reading, and of course writing.

We both originally come from the US but we are currently living on the east coast of Scotland as I pursue my Msc in Archaeology.

I am trying to be a bit more active on here and I am always open to things like tags and asks, even if it takes me a bit to respond.

I think that's about it for me, and so without further ado let me introduce or reintroduce you to my WIP.

Testaments of the Green Sea

Genre: Epic Fantasy

Themes and Tropes (Or more accurately a random assortment of words vaguely related to the plot): Found Family, immortality, loss, love, war, power, memory, magic, insanity, The passage of time, growing up, queerness in the ancient world, violence, spirits, fantasy outside of medieval europe

Summary: Book one of the Testaments of the Green Sea (The lands of the Green Sea are pictured above) follows the journeys of the giant slave Narul and the princess Ninma. After unexpected tragedy forces the two to flee from the Great city of Labisa, they find themselves on a journey which carries them across the ancient lands of Kishetal. Along the way they encounter spirits, demons, war, gods, pirates, and slavers. TW for death/grief, violence/blood/gore, mental illness, physical illness, abuse, and cannibalism, awkward queerness, secondhand embarrasment etc, etc.

Excerpt( First Paragraph of Chapter 1): The blood dripped into the awaiting bowl, painting its alabaster walls crimson. The slave watched the dark liquid trickle down his arm, skirting past the hairs, rolling veins, and moles. Even after these twenty years of weekly blood lettings, he could not shake a creeping feeling of unease as his eyes followed the sanguine river creeping its way across his arm. His own face gazed back at him from the scarlet pool. He could not meet his own eye, could not stand to look that creature. He turned away.

Draft Status: The second draft of the manuscript is currently being edited, I will be looking for my first round of Beta Readers likely before the end of the year.

This is just part one of a much larger series. My partner is currently working on the beginnings of their own series, set in the same world but 3,000 years in the future, roughly aligning with our own Great War Period. I'm so excited to share more with you, and I love answering questions!

Narul and Ninma courtesy of @faeporcelain

[melikemordemjaponi]

＊Syrian Kurdish commander says Kobani likely target of threatened Turkish ground offensive

Following Turkish airstrikes on his main headquarters in northeast Syria, SDF commander Mazlum Kobane talks with Al-Monitor about Erdogan's threats of a new ground offensive.

Al-Monitor: Why is Turkey attacking you so intensively at this particular time?

Kobane: Turkey is opposed to gains by any Kurds, be they in Syria, Iraq, Iran or inside Turkey itself. Turkey wants to destroy our autonomous administration. That’s its overarching goal. But most immediately there is the question of elections in Turkey. Though these attacks, Erdogan and his government are laying the ground, setting the public mood for the forthcoming elections. 

Link : https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2022/11/syrian-kurdish-commander-says-kobani-likely-target-threatened-turkish-ground#ixzz7lRzn9Ca0

Image from the text of the article.

＊Suriyeli Kürt komutan Kobani'nin Türkiye'nin kara harekatı tehdidinin hedefi olabileceğini söyledi

Türkiye'nin Suriye'nin kuzeydoğusundaki ana karargâhına düzenlediği hava saldırısının ardından SDG komutanı Mazlum Kobane, Erdoğan'ın yeni bir kara harekâtı tehdidini Al-Monitor'a değerlendirdi.

Al-Monitor: Türkiye neden tam da bu dönemde size bu kadar yoğun saldırıyor?

Kobani: Türkiye ister Suriye'de, ister Irak'ta, ister İran'da, ister Türkiye'nin içinde olsun Kürtlerin kazanımlarına karşı. Türkiye bizim özerk yönetimimizi yok etmek istiyor. Bu onun genel amacı. Ama en önemlisi Türkiye'deki seçimler meselesi. Erdoğan ve hükümeti bu saldırılarla önümüzdeki seçimler için zemin hazırlıyor, kamuoyunun havasını belirliyor.

Makale metninden görüntü.

＊シリアのクルド人司令官は西クルディスタン(シリア北部)コバネーがトルコの地上攻撃のターゲットになる可能性が高いと語る｡

トルコによるシリア北東部の司令部への空爆を受け､シリア民主軍のマズルム・コバネー司令官が､新たな地上戦の脅威についてアル・モニターに語っている。

アル・モニター：トルコはなぜ､この時期にこれほどまでに集中的にあなた方を攻撃しているのでしょうか。

コバネー(敬称略)：トルコは、シリア、イラク、イラン、トルコ国内を問わず､あらゆるクルド人による利得に反対しています。トルコは私たちの自治行政を破壊したいのです。それが彼らの包括的な目標です。しかし最も直接的な問題は､トルコにおける選挙の問題です。

今回の攻撃で､エルドアン大統領とその政府は来るべき選挙のための基盤を築き､国民のムードを作りつつある。

アル・モニターより記事一部抜粋ｰ訳+画像とも

[ritchiepage2001newaccount]

#CorpMedia #Idiocracy #Oligarchs #MegaBanks vs #Union #Occupy #NoDAPL #BLM #SDF #DACA #MeToo #Humanity #DemExit #FeelTheBern

Syrian town struggles to cope alone after key victory over Islamic State [UPDATES]

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-syria-kurds-idUSKBN1CK0AQ

Islamic State’s defeat in predominately Kurdish Kobani in early 2015 helped turn the tide against the ultra-militant group and marked the start of a more open U.S. military relationship with the Kurdish YPG militia...

RELATED: Battle for Kobane: Key events

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-29688108

RELATED UPDATE: Turkey’s Dangerous New Exports: Pan-Islamist, Neo-Ottoman Visions and Regional Instability

https://www.mei.edu/publications/turkeys-dangerous-new-exports-pan-islamist-neo-ottoman-visions-and-regional

RELATED UPDATE: Turkey’s Relationship with ISIS Proves It Is Deserting Its European Allies

https://besacenter.org/turkey-isis-relationship/

RELATED UPDATE: Turkish forces make false claims about YPG grave

https://npasyria.com/en/62387/

RELATED UPDATE: Turkey accused of bulldozing cemetery to create 'mass grave' - analysis

https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/turkey-accused-of-bulldozing-cemetery-to-create-mass-grave-analysis-674145

RELATED UPDATE: Erdogan to steal more of Syria? Al Jazeera floods the world with racist and genocidal Turkish/Qatari propaganda

https://thefreeonline.com/2021/10/12/al-jazeera-floods-the-world-with-racist-and-genocidal-turkish-qatari-propaganda/

RELATED UPDATE: Turkey Helps ISIS Attack Rojava

https://www.thenation.com/article/world/turkey-isis-rojava-prisoners/

RELATED UPDATE: Islamic State leader killed during raid by US special forces in Syria

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/03/us-special-forces-kill-suspected-jihadists-in-north-west-syria-raid

RELATED UPDATE: Resurrecting terror in the AANES: Turkey’s ISIS prison riot in Hesekê

https://anfenglishmobile.com/features/resurrecting-terror-in-the-aanes-turkey-s-isis-prison-riot-in-heseke-57981

RELATED UPDATE: UN report indicates al-Qaeda and ISIS enjoy safe haven in Turkish-controlled Idlib

https://nordicmonitor.com/2022/02/the-un-report-indicates-al-qaeda-and-isis-enjoys-safe-haven-in-turkish-controlled-idlib/

RELATED UPDATE: US raid raises questions on Turkey’s commitment vs. Islamic State

https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2022/02/us-raid-raises-questions-turkeys-commitment-vs-islamic-state

RELATED UPDATE: The killing of Qurayshi: Are Turkey and ISIS still bonded?

https://ahvalnews.com/turkey-islamic-state/killing-qurayshi-are-turkey-and-isis-still-bonded

RELATED UPDATE: SDF provides humanitarian assistance to people affected by ISIS prison attack

https://anfenglishmobile.com/rojava-syria/sdf-provides-humanitarian-assistance-to-people-affected-by-isis-prison-attack-58095

RELATED UPDATE: Islamic State collaborators received Turkish citizenship, official report shows

https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2022/02/islamic-state-collaborators-received-turkish-citizenship-official-report-shows

RELATED UPDATE: SDF frees young Yazidi woman before ISIS mercenaries managed to take her to Turkey

https://anfenglishmobile.com/women/sdf-frees-young-yazidi-woman-before-isis-mercenaries-managed-to-take-her-to-turkey-58197

RELATED UPDATE: SDF arrests two ISIS members

https://anfenglishmobile.com/rojava-syria/sdf-arrests-two-isis-members-58215

RELATED UPDATE: Suruç Families Initiative demands justice on 79th month since the Suruç Massacre

https://anfenglishmobile.com/human-rights/suruc-families-initiative-demands-justice-on-79th-month-since-the-suruc-massacre-58263

RELATED UPDATE: Appeals court upholds prison sentence for Demirtas

https://anfenglishmobile.com/news/appeals-court-upholds-prison-sentence-for-demirtas-58274

RELATED UPDATE: Noam Chomsky speaks about the Kurdish question today

https://anfenglishmobile.com/news/noam-chomsky-speaks-about-the-kurdish-question-today-58280

RELATED UPDATE: Turkish border guards kill old man working in Idlib countryside, SOHR reports

https://anfenglishmobile.com/rojava-syria/turkish-border-guards-kill-old-man-working-in-idlib-countryside-sohr-reports-58288

RELATED UPDATE: Women launch activities for 8 March in North-East Syria

https://anfenglishmobile.com/women/women-launch-activities-for-8-march-in-north-east-syria-58315

RELATED UPDATE: SDF Special Units arrest Iraqi ISIS terrorist trying to cross into Turkey

https://anfenglishmobile.com/rojava-syria/sdf-special-units-arrest-iraqi-isis-terrorist-trying-to-cross-into-turkey-58322

[revolutionaryeye]

Defending Afrin

Turkey's war on Afrin is an attack not only on Kurdish self-determination, but on democracy and women's liberation in the Middle East.

Kurdish YPG fighters in Afrin, northern Syria. KurdishStruggle / Flickr

When thousands gathered in Afrin for the funeral procession of Barin Kobani, a woman fighter of the Kurdish Women’s Protection Units (YPJ), whose lifeless body was mutilated by Turkish-backed jihadist mercenaries, olive branches were reaching out of the crowd. Afrin, located at the Syrian-Turkish border and in the center of Mount Kurd, is not only known for its predominantly Kurdish population but also for its olive groves and blooming fields, surrounded by a mountainous landscape. For more than two weeks now Turkish tanks and fighter jets, accompanied by bearded men shouting “God is great” and raising their index finger, have been attacking civilian neighborhoods and positions held by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in what Turkey has cynically named “Operation Olive Branch.”

According to a World Health Organization report, eighty-six civilians — including a whole family of seven — have been killed, along with two hundred wounded. More than ten thousand fled due to the bombings in one week. Kurdish sources such as the Administration of Afrin Canton Council and the head of the Afrin hospital however say the number is even higher. Turkish attacks in Afrin, which have also struck ancient sites, explicitly breach international law. Yet since the beginning of the first attacks on January 20, no outrage against this military aggression has been vocalized by a government or the international community.

“Kurds have no friends but the mountains” has become an easy refrain over the years to respond to the injustices the Kurdish people have been subjected to. But, after more than a century of atrocities, the Afrin assault still feels particular and urgent, an opportunity for meaningful solidarity before all democratic accomplishments in Northern Syria are destroyed by Turkey, her jihadist foot-soldiers, and the imperial powers. The Afrin crisis has emerged as an epitome of the region’s predicament and raises three fundamental questions: What is Turkey’s role in the historical oppression of Kurds in the region? Who today challenges them as the defenders of Afrin? And what are the geopolitics of the conflict?

  Erdoğan’s Targets                                      

Whenever the Turkish government launches an “operation,” especially an “anti-terror operation,” you can be certain that Kurds will be the first ones in the crosshairs. After the June 2015 elections, when Erdoğan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) lost the majority it needed to form a government on its own, snap elections were announced for November 1. In the meantime, the peace process with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) was terminated and a state of emergency declared in the country’s Kurdish southeast. The government, hand in hand with the military, launched so-called “cleansing operations” against supposed PKK members and targeted strongholds of the People’s Democratic Party (HDP), a left-wing alliance with its roots in Kurdish politics and effectively the only challenger of the AKP, in an act of collective punishment. A sizeable death toll and significant displacements were the consequence.

About this time two years ago, on February 5, the AKP government revealed a ten-step action plan to “repair” southeastern Turkey, which had been destroyed in the wake of the siege (or, as then-Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu would have it, was “traumatized by terrorists who started the fire”). This post-operation “master plan” included consultations with village guards that function as pro-government militia and the construction of bulletproof security towers in urban districts. It was, in reality, just another phase of the warfare, an attempt at tearing local residents from their historically inhabited spaces and creating obedience......

Continued:- https://jacobinmag.com/2018/02/afrin-kurdistan-syria-turkey-erdogan-is-war

[semdjonson]

In the vicinity of the city of Ain Isa, located east of the Euphrates River in the north of the country, fighting has been ongoing for a long time between the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army, which consists of jihadist groups and the SDF.

First of all, Ain Isa is one of the important points on the strategically important M-4 highway, which stretches from Latakia to Aleppo, and from there runs to Kamishliya and connects northern Syria with the Iraqi border. And now Ain Isa, located on this highway, serves as an important intersection connecting Manbij and Kobani, Haseke and Kamishlia.

The location of Ain Issa also provides an answer to the question of why jihadist groups within the Syrian National Army (SNA), with artillery support from the Turkish Armed Forces, are attacking this settlement. If this strategic intersection on the M-4 highway can be taken under control, then one of the most important nodal points of the autonomous region controlled by the SDF in northeastern Syria will be cut off. In other words, choosing Ain Issa as a target makes sense as an operation aimed at partitioning northern Syria. But the most important thing is the opportunity to increase the smuggling of oil from the Syrian fields.

[techcrunchappcom]

New Post has been published on https://techcrunchapp.com/nation-and-world-news-briefs-national-5/

Nation and world news briefs | National

Minnesota rider believed to be first to die from COVID-19 after attending Sturgis rally

MINNEAPOLIS — A participant in last month’s Sturgis Motorcycle Rally in South Dakota is among the 1,830 people in Minnesota who have died of COVID-19.

The rider was a man in his 60s with underlying health conditions who was hospitalized and placed in intensive care following his infection with the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, according to the Minnesota Department of Health.

Fifty Minnesotans who took part in the Sturgis event, which draws hundreds of thousands of people each summer, have tested positive.

No one event appears to be the epicenter for the infections suffered by the man who died or any other Minnesotans, said Kris Ehresmann, state infectious disease director.

“They attended multiple events, stayed at multiple campgrounds, were inside, outside,” she said. “I think, given the number of individuals that were participating in the Sturgis event, I think its fair to say that pretty much everyone was in a crowded setting.”

Several other states have reported infections among Sturgis participants as well, and Minnesota has found signs of secondary transmissions from Sturgis participants to others back home. One participant from Minnesota with a confirmed infection appeared to spread the virus at a recent wedding, Ehresmann said.

— Star Tribune (Minneapolis)

Fox News anchor Chris Wallace returns as presidential debate moderator

Fox News anchor Chris Wallace will be a moderator of the first debate between President Donald Trump and his opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden, on Sept. 29.

The Commission on Presidential Debates has named Wallace, who anchors the weekly Washington roundtable program “Fox News Sunday,” and three other journalists to handle the events that will be broadcast across the major broadcast networks and cable channels.

Wallace presided over the third debate between Trump and Hillary Clinton in 2016 and was widely praised for his handling of the event. He was the first Fox News anchor to ever moderate a presidential debate.

The first of the 2020 debates will be held at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland.

Steve Scully, the political editor at C-SPAN and host of the cable channel’s morning show “Washington Journal,” will moderate the second meeting between the two candidates on Oct. 15, to be held at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts in Miami.

NBC News White House correspondent Kristen Welker will be the moderator for the third debate on Oct. 22 at Belmont University in Nashville.

Susan Page, Washington bureau chief for USA Today, will handle the sole meeting between Vice President Mike Pence and Biden’s running mate Sen. Kamala Harris of California on Oct. 7. The University of Utah in Salt Lake City will be the site.

Suspected ISIS fighter from Dallas pleads guilty to terrorism charge, faces 20 years

FORT WORTH, Texas — A 23-year-old from Dallas accused of providing communication support for front-line troops fighting in Syria pleaded guilty Wednesday to conspiring to provide material support to terrorism.

Omer Kuzu faces up to 20 years in prison and is scheduled for sentencing in January, according to a U.S. Department of Justice news release.

The release outlined the following details:

Kuzu, now 25, said he and his brother, Yusuf, left Texas for Istanbul, Turkey on Oct. 16, 2014, and then went to Orfa, Turkey, where they were smuggled across the border into Syria. They ended up in Mosul, Iraq.

The two brothers and 40 other fighters underwent five days of physical and weapons training and were then sent to Raqqah, Syria, where Omer Kuzu started work at the ISIS telecommunications directorate.

In Raqqah, Omer Kuzu pledged allegiance to ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and the Islamic Caliphate, and was given a monthly stipend and a Chinese-made AK-47, and that is where he also took an ISIS bride.

Omer Kuzu was sent to Kobani, Syria and Hama, Syria, where he provided communications support for ISIS fighters on the front lines and worked in the Caliphate’s technology center.

In March 2019, Omer Kuzu was captured by Syrian Democratic Forces alongside 1,500 suspected ISIS fighters. Omer Kuzu was handed over to FBI custody, returned to American soil, and charged with conspiring to provide material support to ISIS.

Omer Kuzu said he knew ISIS had been designated a foreign terrorist organization and that it engaged in terrorist activities.

— Fort Worth Star-Telegram

A mask selfie could be part of your next Uber ride

PHILADELPHIA — The next time you’re in an Uber vehicle, you may need to prove that you’re protecting yourself and others from COVID-19.

Passengers reported by a driver to have ditched a mask will soon be made to take a selfie showing they are wearing a face covering before their next trip, the rideshare giant announced Tuesday. Masks have been required since May, enforced upon riders by a checklist agreement, but the latest effort looks to deliver evidence.

It may only be fair: Uber drivers and delivery people already have had to take a selfie of themselves wearing a mask before going active for their day.

“We firmly believe that accountability is a two-way street. That’s why we’re expanding the same technology to riders, too,” Sachin Kansal, Uber’s global head of safety product, wrote in a blog post Tuesday. “With the addition of this new feature, one driver’s feedback can help ensure the safety of Uber for the next driver.”

An Uber spokesperson could not say when the system will roll out in Philadelphia but said “it will be by the end of September.”

When riders in question hail a vehicle through the Uber app, they will be met with a set of safety guidelines followed by a prompt asking them to take a photo accompanied with a message that reads: “Due to driver feedback from your recent trip, we’d like to verify that you’re wearing a face cover or mask.”

Lyft is piloting a verification system in selected markets, including Philadelphia, to ensure that all parties are wearing a face covering, according to a company spokesperson. Lyft plans to launch the system everywhere in “the coming months.”

Mask wearing has been proven to be effective in protecting against the spread of the coronavirus.

— The Philadelphia Inquirer

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Copyright 2020 Tribune Content Agency.

[newstfionline]

Syria Braces for Dramatic Escalation Set to be ‘Bloodier Than Ghouta’

Patrick Cockburn, The Independent, March 7, 2018

In a field beside an abandoned railway station close to the Turkish border in northern Syria, Kurdish fighters are retraining to withstand Turkish air strikes. “We acted like a regular army when we were fighting Daesh [Isis] with US air support,” says Rojva, a veteran Kurdish commander of the People’s Protection Units (YPG). “But now it is us who may be under Turkish air attack and we will have to behave more like guerrillas.”

Rojva and his brigade have just returned from 45 days fighting Isis in Deir Ezzor province in eastern Syria and are awaiting orders which may redeploy them to face the Turkish army that invaded the Kurdish enclave of Afrin on 20 January. Rojva says that “we are mainly armed with light weapons like the Kalashnikov, RPG [rocket propelled grenade launcher] and light machine guns, but we will be resisting tanks and aircraft”. He makes clear that, whatever happened, they would fight to the end.

Kurdish and allied Arab units are streaming north from the front to the east of the Euphrates, where Isis is beginning to counter-attack, in order to stop the Turkish advance. Some 1,700 Arab militia left the area for Afrin on Tuesday and Turkey is demanding that the US stop them. The invasion is now in its seventh week and Rojva and his fighters take some comfort in the fact that it is moving so slowly. But the Turkish strategy has been to take rural areas before mowing methodically to surround and besiege Afrin City and residential areas.

The big battles in Afrin are still to come and are likely to be as destructive and bloody as anything seen in Eastern Ghouta, Raqqa or East Aleppo. YPG fighters have battle experience stretching back to at least 2012, much of its gained against fanatical opponents like Isis. The likelihood is that, as in Ghouta, the Turkish generals will seek to avoid the heavy losses inevitable in street fighting and pound Afrin into ruins with air strikes and artillery fire. Civilian casualties are bound to be horrendous.

The Syrian Kurds believe they are facing an existential threat. They believe Turkey wants to eliminate not just the enclave of Afrin, but the 25 per cent of Syria that the Kurds have taken with US backing since 2015. Some think that defeat will mean the ethnic cleansing of Kurds from Afrin, which has traditionally been one of their core majority areas. They cite a speech by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan made the day after the start of the invasion started, claiming that “55 per cent of Afrin is Arab, 35 per cent are the Kurds … and about 7 per cent are Turkmen. [We aim] to give Afrin back to its rightful owners.” There is a suspicion among Kurdish leaders that Erdogan plans to create a Sunni bloc of territory north and west of Aleppo which will be under direct or indirect Turkish control.

The Kurdish leaders are convinced that Erdogan is determined to destroy their de facto state in the long run, but differ about the timing and objectives of the present attack. Elham Ahmad, the co-president of the Syrian Democratic Council that helps administer the Kurdish-held area, believes that the Turkish assault on Afrin, if successful, will set “a precedent for a further Turkish military advance”.

Ahmad had just returned from Afrin where she was born and where her family still lives. “Our convoy of 150 civilian cars was hit by a Turkish air strike,” she said. “We ran away from the cars, but 30 of them were destroyed and one person killed.” She is angry that the outside world is exclusively preoccupied with the bombardment of Eastern Ghouta by President Bashar al-Assad’s forces, but ignores similar bombing and shelling in Afrin where, she says, 204 civilians had been killed, including 61 children, as of last weekend.

She expects that the next Turkish target, if its so-called Operation Olive Branch succeeds in Afrin, will be the Arab city of Manbij that was taken by the YPG in 2016. Strategically placed on the main road from Aleppo to the Kurdish heartlands, with a diversion where part of the highway is held by Turkish forces, it is a prosperous looking place full of shops crammed with goods and produce. Local rumour has it that one small shop recently changed hands for $1m (£720,000). It is the main supply line to the Kurdish zone, the highway crowded with oil tankers bringing crude oil from Kurdish-held oilfields far to the east to the Syrian government refinery at Homs.

If local people are nervous about the prospect of being submerged by the impending battle for northern Syria, they are not showing it. After being occupied by Isis and besieged by the YPG, they have strong nerves. They may also reflect that, if war is coming to their city and its 300,000 people, there is not a lot they can do to avert it. The main reason they might feel secure is a US pledge to defend their city against a Turkish attack, a promise backed up by regular and highly visible patrols of five or six US armoured vehicles carrying large Stars and Stripes. But the US willingness to confront its Nato partner Turkey is nuanced, particularly since Isis was defeated last year, though the movement is not entirely dead.

There is a sense of phoney war on the front line between the forces of the Manbij Military Council and the Turkish army and its allied anti-Assad militias, who are dug in three or four miles north of the city. Most of the front lines in the Syrian civil war are a depressing scene of abandoned and half-wrecked buildings, even when there is no fighting going on. The Manbij front is idyllic by comparison, though just how long it will stay that way is another question.

This is a fertile heavily populated country with a Mediterranean feel to it, its hills and small fields full of olive trees, pines, poplars and almond trees which are covered in little white flowers. There are tractors on the roads and, just behind the front, we drove through the Arab village of Dadat, whose streets full of cheerful-looking children excited by the sight of military vehicles.

A trench and rampart gauged out the hillside by bulldozers zigzags upwards through a green field to a fortified position on a hilltop. Peering through gun slits in a sandbagged post on top of an earth bank, one could see Turkish positions not far away on the far side of the Sajur river. “They have tanks and artillery on every hilltop and they fire randomly with heavy machine guns every night,” says Farhat Kobani, a local commander whose orders come from the Manbij Military Council. The Turkish army is backed up by Ahrar al-Sham, a militant Islamist movement long allied to Turkey, whose men act as auxiliaries.

These exchanges of fire do not seem very serious because everybody, at least in day time, is standing upright in easy range of the other side and Farhat says his men have not suffered any dead or wounded. Phoney war is often derided, but there is a lot to be said for it when compared to the real thing--and, unfortunately, that may not be too far away.

[syriafreenews]

Provocations while on patrol

Joint Russian-Turkish patrols are an integral part of ensuring the security of many parts of Syria. In the province of Idlib, a patrol protects against illegal actions and protects local residents from terrorists who travel along the newly-opened M 4 highway, which ensures the province's stable connection with the rest of the Syrian regions. Similar tasks are performed by Russian and Turkish troops on the eastern bank of the Euphrates River, protecting the local, mainly Kurdish, population from the attack of bandits.

The fact that not everyone equally approves this event is quite logical. In Idlib province, the local population has been under the influence of terrorist propaganda for too long, and therefore they don’t know what the patrols are for, what goals they are pursuing, and their understanding of the role of Russia and Turkey in Syria has been shaped by radicals whose plans to seize vast territories of the Syrian Arab Republic fiasco, largely due to the interaction of these two countries. The same is in the east of the country. However, instead of propaganda of terrorists, the information impact and US dollars have a significant influence on the minds of the local population. At the same time, to intensify propaganda, as has already been said more than once, a detachment of psychological operations by the US Army arrived in the eastern provinces of Syria about two months ago. The unit’s tasks include organizing civilian protests, blocking patrols, disrupting the delivery of humanitarian aid to Russia and official Damascus to residents. In other words, there is every hindrance to the peacekeeping activities of Russia, and, according to a number of agreements, Turkey, in Syria. Moreover, the Americans use the units of the Assayish Kurdish security service for their purposes, which should, under the guise of local residents, implement the above measures.

On July 2, 2020, an incident occurred that fully demonstrates the results of the work of the American psychological operations units, the Assayish Kurdish security service, as well as the residents they hired, who, driven to desperation by the tyrannical policies of the local pro-American authorities, are ready to take any step for a modest reward. And just such a step was taken during the joint Russian-Turkish patrol in the area of ​​the village of Kobani. During the movement of the column, local residents in several places blocked the military route with garbage, and also threw stones at their cars. The report turned out to be just wonderful, which instantly spread across social networks and a number of online publications. Moreover, Russian pilots who accompanied the movement of the convoy in combat helicopters, to the delight of the invited operators, during one of the maneuvers in the area of ​​the village, shot heat traps, as can be seen in the video and photos being distributed. However, the Kurdish journalists of the ANHA news agency, in order to increase the popularity of their article, immediately invented that the Russians dropped tear gas cylinders on peaceful protesters.

At the same time, those who prepared this provocation, as well as those who shot this report made a number of omissions. To begin with, cameras and journalists are placed exclusively in those places where protesters stand. Moreover, on one of the frames, three operators are clearly visible with video equipment placed on massive tripods. Taking into account the weight of such equipment, it is easy to imagine that they were placed there in advance, and the journalists knew exactly about the upcoming action, and its scenario in advance. The second nuance, which is worth special attention, is a news agency report on the dumping of tear gas cylinders from Russian helicopters. I want to ask a question, why not with chlorine? Apparently they were afraid that the commission of the Organization for the Prohibition of the Proliferation of Chemical Weapons would immediately arrive at such a fake, which would immediately reveal this fraud. A tear gas does not seem to be worth such attention of the world organization. But enough for the scandal. However, the journalists who wrote about the use of gas by Russian pilots did not take into account the fact that no modification of Russian helicopters includes devices for dropping chemical ammunition, especially those that provide patrols. What journalists mistook for tear gas checkers is thermal traps that protect the helicopter from attack from rocket launchers from the ground. And the fact that the Russian pilots shot them over the village is quite logical. According to all the rules that are followed not only by Russian, but also by American and Turkish pilots, they are obliged to fly over the settlements, flying heat traps, since it is almost impossible to see a terrorist with a portable anti-aircraft anti-aircraft complex in a city building in a timely manner.

The incident in Kobani is actually nothing more than a planned action by US psychological operations units operating in eastern Syria. Washington is extremely dissatisfied with the Russian military presence in the region and is ready to do whatever it takes to reduce Russia's growing influence in eastern Syria. At the same time, the position of the Russian Federation remains unchanged and nothing will force it to abandon its obligations to ensure the security of citizens of the Syrian Arab Republic.

[biofunmy]

After Syria attack, Trump welcomes Turkey’s Erdogan to White House

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President Donald Trump reacts negatively during his press conference with the Turkish president about the impeachment testimonies. USA TODAY

WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump heaped praise on Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan during a day-long visit to the White House on Wednesday despite bipartisan concern that the authoritarian leader is sowing chaos in the Middle East.

As House lawmakers began public hearings to investigate Trump’s interactions with Ukraine, the president fully embraced another controversy weighing on his White House: His decision last month to withdraw U.S. troops from northern Syria, clearing the way for Turkey’s invasion into that country days later.

There was little sign Wednesday of the bipartisan criticism that has cropped up in response to Trump’s approach to Turkey. After a series of meetings, the president told reporters during an East Room press conference that he hopes to broker an agreement with Turkey that would significantly expand trade between the two countries. 

“I’m a big fan of the president,” Trump said of Erdogan. 

The meeting with Erdogan, in the works for weeks, allowed Trump to marshal some attention away from the impeachment hearings taking place on Capitol Hill, but it also renewed focus on an issue that has caused rebellion within his own party. 

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“Although I have expressed concerns about granting President Erdogan such an honor in light of his recent actions, I hope the meeting produces better behavior from this important NATO ally,” Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said earlier Wednesday. “I share my colleagues’ uneasiness at seeing President Erdogan honored at the White House.” 

Both Democrats and Republicans have argued Trump’s decision to withdraw U.S. troops from Syria was a betrayal of the Kurdish forces that helped American troops fight the Islamic State, also known as ISIS. Trump dismissed those concerns Wednesday. 

Trump said Erdogan, who has described many of the Kurds on the Turkey-Syria border as terrorists, has a “great relationship with the Kurds.”

Speaking to reporters, the president also sided with Erdogan over the question of Syrian refugees. He said Europe should help Turkey pay for the more than 3 million refugees who fled Syria during that country’s civil war.

Erdogan said Turkey had resettled 365,000 of those Syrian refugees into northern Syria. But many of them come from other parts of the country and some critics have suggested that by relocating them to northern Syria, Turkey is forcing Kurds, Christians and other minorities there to flee – essentially engaging in “ethnic cleansing.”

Trump did not answer a question from a Turkish reporter about whether he is planning to invite the leader of the Syrian Democratic Forces, General Mazloum Kobani, to Washington. Lawmakers in Congress have pushed for such a visit and Kobani tweeted that Trump had invited him.

“We’ll see what happens,” Trump said in response.

Trump invited a group of Republican senators to meet with Erdogan. Reporters whisked into the Oval Office to briefly witness the meeting saw Sens. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.; Jim Risch, R-Idaho; Ted Cruz, R-Texas; Rick Scott, R-Fla.; and Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, sitting with the two leaders.

“The purpose of this meeting is to have an American civics lesson for our friends in Turkey,” said Graham, who has been highly critical of Erdogan and Trump’s decision to withdraw U.S. troops from northern Syria. “And there’s a pony in there somewhere if we can find it.”

Erdogan’s visit comes amid reports of clashes in Syria – and questions about whether Turkish-backed forces have engaged in ethnic cleansing and other atrocities. Turkey’s assault, along with the U.S. withdrawal from northeastern Syria, has prompted more than 180,000 civilians to flee the border areas, according to the United Nations. 

President Donald Trump meets with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the Oval Office of the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 13, 2019, in Washington. (Photo: Evan Vucci, AP)

More: ‘It is a zone of death, and we’re complicit’: Why evangelicals are upset with Trump’s Syria policy

Although the United States brokered a cease-fire between Turkey and the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, it’s not clear how well that is holding. According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, fighting has continued this week between the SDF and forces loyal to Turkey. Russian and Syrian government troops have moved in to fill the power vacuum left by the U.S. withdrawal.

“The cease-fire is holding very well,” Trump said earlier in the Oval Office. 

Trump did raise one major point of friction with Erdogan: Turkey’s purchase of a Russian-made missile system, the S-400. Turkey received delivery of the Russian weapons system this year, despite stern U.S. warnings against such a move.

The White House responded by canceling Turkey’s participation in the Pentagon’s elite Joint Strike Fighter program, saying the S-400 system could be used to collect sensitive data on the F-35 jet fighter program, making Turkey’s participation “impossible.”

Trump said Turkey’s decision had caused “very serious challenges for us.” The president is under pressure to impose stiff sanctions on Turkey for the S-400 purchase, as well as for its Syria attack. The House approved a biting sanctions bill last month aimed at crippling Turkey’s economy and punishing Erdogan personally by requiring an assessment of his net worth.

“We’ll be talking about it,” Trump said of the weapons purchase.  

Contributing: David Jackson

Read or Share this story: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2019/11/13/after-syria-attack-trump-welcome-turkeys-erdogan-white-house/2563828001/

Sahred From Source link World News

from WordPress http://bit.ly/33RYupl via IFTTT

[mideastsoccer]

Turkey and the Kurds: What goes around comes around

By James M. Dorsey

A podcast version of this story is available on Soundcloud, Itunes, Spotify, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spreaker, Pocket Casts, Tumblr, Podbean and Castbox.

 Turkey, like much of the Middle East, is discovering that what goes around comes around.

Not only because President Recep Tayyip Erdogan appears to have miscalculated the fallout of what may prove to be a foolhardy intervention in Syria and neglected alternative options that could have strengthened Turkey’s position without sparking the ire of much of the international community.

But also because what could prove to be a strategic error is rooted in a policy of decades of denial of Kurdish identity and suppression of Kurdish cultural and political rights that was more likely than not to fuel conflict rather than encourage societal cohesion.

The policy midwifed the birth in the 1970s to militant groups like the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK), which only dropped its demand for Kurdish independence in recent years.

The group that has waged a low intensity insurgency that has cost tens of thousands of lives has been declared a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union.

Turkish refusal to acknowledge the rights of the Kurds, who are believed to account for up to 20 percent of the country’s population traces its roots to the carving of modern Turkey out of the ruins of the Ottoman empire by its visionary founder, Mustafa Kemal, widely known as Ataturk, Father of the Turks.

It is entrenched in Mr. Kemal’s declaration in a speech in 1923 to celebrate Turkish independence of ��how happy is the one who calls himself a Turk,” an effort to forge a national identity for country that was an ethnic mosaic.

The phrase was incorporated half a century later in Turkey’s student oath and ultimately removed from it in 2013 at a time of peace talks between Turkey and the PKK by then prime minister, now president Erdogan.

It took the influx of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Kurds in the late 1980s and early 1990s as well as the 1991 declaration by the United States, Britain and France of a no-fly zone in northern Iraq that enabled the emergence of an autonomous Iraqi Kurdish region to spark debate in Turkey about the Kurdish question and prompt the government to refer to Kurds as Kurds rather than mountain Turks.

Ironically, Turkey’s enduring refusal to acknowledge Kurdish rights and its long neglect of development of the pre-dominantly Kurdish southeast of the country fuelled demands for greater rights rather than majority support for Kurdish secession largely despite the emergence of the PKK

Most Turkish Kurds, who could rise to the highest offices in the land s long as they identified as Turks rather than Kurds, resembled Palestinians with Israeli citizenship, whose options were more limited even if they endorsed the notion of a Jewish state.

Nonetheless, both minorities favoured an independent state for their brethren on the other side of the border but did not want to surrender the opportunities that either Turkey or Israel offered them.

The existence for close to three decades of a Kurdish regional government in northern Iraq and a 2017 referendum in which an overwhelming majority voted for Iraqi Kurdish independence, bitterly rejected and ultimately nullified by Iraqi, Turkish and Iranian opposition, did little to fundamentally change Turkish Kurdish attitudes.

If the referendum briefly soured Turkish-Iraqi Kurdish relations, it failed to undermine the basic understanding underlying a relationship that could have guided Turkey’s approach towards the Kurds in Syria even if dealing with Iraqi Kurds may have been easier because, unlike Turkish Kurds, they had not engaged in political violence against Turkey.

The notion that there was no alternative to the Turkish intervention in Syria is further countered by the fact that Turkish PKK negotiations that started in 2012 led a year later to a ceasefire and a boosting of efforts to secure a peaceful resolution.

The talks prompted imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan to publish a letter endorsing the ceasefire, the disarmament and withdrawal from Turkey of PKK fighters, and a call for an end to the insurgency. Mr. Ocalan predicted that 2013 would be the year in which the Turkish Kurdish issues would be resolved peacefully.

The PKK's military leader, Cemil Bayik, told the BBC three years later that "we don't want to separate from Turkey and set up a state. We want to live within the borders of Turkey on our own land freely.”

The talks broke down in 2015 against the backdrop of the Syrian war and the rise as a US ally of the United States in the fight against the Islamic State of the PKK’s Syrian affiliate, the People's Protection Units (YPG).

Bitterly opposed to the US-YPG alliance, Turkey demanded that the PKK halt its resumption of attacks on Turkish targets and disarm prior to further negotiations.

Turkey responded to the breakdown and resumption of violence with a brutal crackdown in the southeast of the country and on the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP).

Nonetheless, in a statement issued from prison earlier this year that envisioned an understanding between Turkey and Syrian Kurdish forces believed to be aligned with the PKK, Mr. Ocalan declared that “we believe, with regard to the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the problems in Syria should be resolved within the framework of the unity of Syria, based on constitutional guarantees and local democratic perspectives. In this regard, it should be sensitive to Turkey’s concerns.”

Turkey’s emergence as one of Iraqi Kurdistan’s foremost investors and trading partners in exchange for Iraqi Kurdish acquiescence in Turkish countering the PKK’s presence in the region could have provided inspiration for a US-sponsored safe zone in northern Syria that Washington and Ankara had contemplated.

The Turkish-Iraqi Kurdish understanding enabled Turkey  to allow an armed Iraqi Kurdish force to transit Turkish territory in 2014 to help prevent the Islamic State from conquering the Syrian city of Kobani.

A safe zone would have helped “realign the relationship between Turkey’s Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and its Syrian offshoot… The safe-zone arrangements… envision(ed) drawing down the YPG presence along the border—a good starting point for reining in the PKK, improving U.S. ties with Ankara, and avoiding a potentially destructive Turkish intervention in Syria,” Turkey scholar Sonar Cagaptay suggested in August.

The opportunity that could have created the beginnings of a sustainable solution that would have benefitted Turkey as well as the Kurds fell by the wayside with Mr. Trump’s decision to withdraw US troops from northern Syria.

In many ways, Mr. Erdogan’s decision to opt for a military solution fits the mould of a critical mass of world leaders who look at the world through a civilizational prism and often view national borders in relative terms.

Russian leader Vladimir Putin pointed the way with his 2008 intervention in Georgia and the annexation in 2014 of Crimea as well as Russia’s stirring of pro-Russian insurgencies in two regions of Ukraine.

Mr. Erdogan appears to believe that if Mr. Putin can pull it off, so can he.

Dr. James M. Dorsey is a senior fellow at Nanyang Technological University’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, an adjunct senior research fellow at the National University of Singapore’s Middle East Institute and co-director of the University of Wuerzburg’s Institute of Fan Culture

[kashdharsh-blog]

Erkan Ozgen - Wonderland - 2016 (Until July 28 2019)

Artist Background:

Erkan Ozgen is a Kurdish video/artist, filmmaker, and photographer who was born in Mardin in 1971.

What to look out for + Thematic Analysis:

Wonderland is a film which is centered around Muhammed, who is both deaf and mute. He used to live with his family in a small town named Kobani, Northern Syria. This is his story of what he witnessed when he escaped.

Unlike other refugees, Muhamed was keen to communicate what he saw but unfortunately didn’t have all the tools to do so.

Muhammed’s performance strikes viewers alone with our bare sense and lets us question our own ethics and humanity.

He puts it into perspective the horrific events he would have witnessed. It also becomes apparent to spectators that these images are stuck in his mind as he is unable to express them even though he desperately tries in Wonderland.

At moments, we are able to see both the fear and frustration in his eyes as he  eagerly tries to make Ozgen understand his ‘words and language’

Ozgen hopes that Muhammed’s message will inspire people to create a united voice during a time of conflict. For people like Muhammed who don’t possess a voice physically and culturally. Even though Muhammed has no voice, his story will not be forgotten.

Historical Context:

Kobani used to be in Northern Syria, when Muhammed lived there. Due to the intense conflict surrounding the area, today it is known as Rojova. Rojova became the center of attention on a worldwide scale upon its 107 days long resistance against disproportionately heavy attacks from ISIS which started in September 2014

-Dharsh

[somethingclevermahogony]

OC Art

Hello everybody! Life has been hectic and I haven't been able to post here in quite some time. However, I have just finished the second edit of my WIP, Testaments of the Green Sea. I'm currently waiting for my editor (that is my partner) to finish their own read over of the manuscript.

Way back before everything went haywire, I commisioned a piece from @faeporcelain. It turned out amazing but I somehow failed to ever actually post it here for y'all to see it!

This is their rendition of my two MC's Narul and Ninma. Please go check out some more of their things, I really enjoy their style.

I'm not there yet but when I am satisfied with my edits, I would love to find some beta readers. And I would love discussing more about my story. Few things make me as happy as answering random story and worldbuilding questions. I used to post here relatively often, I might start doing that again if everything else in life permits it.

[merge-merge]

Life under ISIS led these Muslims to Christ Four years have passed since the Islamic State group's fighters were run out of Kobani, a strategic city on the Syrian-Turkish border, but the militants' violent and extreme interpretation of Islam has left some questioning their faith.Read More

[revolutionaryeye]

Defending Afrin

Turkey's war on Afrin is an attack not only on Kurdish self-determination, but on democracy and women's liberation in the Middle East.

Kurdish YPG fighters in Afrin, northern Syria. KurdishStruggle / Flickr

When thousands gathered in Afrin for the funeral procession of Barin Kobani, a woman fighter of the Kurdish Women’s Protection Units (YPJ), whose lifeless body was mutilated by Turkish-backed jihadist mercenaries, olive branches were reaching out of the crowd. Afrin, located at the Syrian-Turkish border and in the center of Mount Kurd, is not only known for its predominantly Kurdish population but also for its olive groves and blooming fields, surrounded by a mountainous landscape. For more than two weeks now Turkish tanks and fighter jets, accompanied by bearded men shouting “God is great” and raising their index finger, have been attacking civilian neighborhoods and positions held by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in what Turkey has cynically named “Operation Olive Branch.”

According to a World Health Organization report, eighty-six civilians — including a whole family of seven — have been killed, along with two hundred wounded. More than ten thousand fled due to the bombings in one week. Kurdish sources such as the Administration of Afrin Canton Council and the head of the Afrin hospital however say the number is even higher. Turkish attacks in Afrin, which have also struck ancient sites, explicitly breach international law. Yet since the beginning of the first attacks on January 20, no outrage against this military aggression has been vocalized by a government or the international community.

“Kurds have no friends but the mountains” has become an easy refrain over the years to respond to the injustices the Kurdish people have been subjected to. But, after more than a century of atrocities, the Afrin assault still feels particular and urgent, an opportunity for meaningful solidarity before all democratic accomplishments in Northern Syria are destroyed by Turkey, her jihadist foot-soldiers, and the imperial powers. The Afrin crisis has emerged as an epitome of the region’s predicament and raises three fundamental questions: What is Turkey’s role in the historical oppression of Kurds in the region? Who today challenges them as the defenders of Afrin? And what are the geopolitics of the conflict?

 Erdoğan’s Targets                                      

Whenever the Turkish government launches an “operation,” especially an “anti-terror operation,” you can be certain that Kurds will be the first ones in the crosshairs. After the June 2015 elections, when Erdoğan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) lost the majority it needed to form a government on its own, snap elections were announced for November 1. In the meantime, the peace process with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) was terminated and a state of emergency declared in the country’s Kurdish southeast. The government, hand in hand with the military, launched so-called “cleansing operations” against supposed PKK members and targeted strongholds of the People’s Democratic Party (HDP), a left-wing alliance with its roots in Kurdish politics and effectively the only challenger of the AKP, in an act of collective punishment. A sizeable death toll and significant displacements were the consequence.

About this time two years ago, on February 5, the AKP government revealed a ten-step action plan to “repair” southeastern Turkey, which had been destroyed in the wake of the siege (or, as then-Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu would have it, was “traumatized by terrorists who started the fire”). This post-operation “master plan” included consultations with village guards that function as pro-government militia and the construction of bulletproof security towers in urban districts. It was, in reality, just another phase of the warfare, an attempt at tearing local residents from their historically inhabited spaces and creating obedience.... Continued:- https://www.jacobinmag.com/2018/02/afrin-kurdistan-syria-turkey-erdogan-is-war

[semdjonson]

The new point of clashes on the map of Syria is Ain Isa. The town, located east of the Euphrates River in the north of the country, has been fighting for some time between the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army, which consists of jihadist groups and the SDF. Ain Issa was one of the targets of the operation called "Source of Peace", carried out by the Turkish authorities in 2019.

First of all, Ain Isa is one of the important points on the strategically important M-4 highway, which stretches from Latakia to Aleppo, and from there runs to Qamishli and connects northern Syria with the Iraqi border. And now Ain Isa, located on this highway, serves as an important intersection connecting Manbij and Kobani, Hasakeh and Qamishli.

The location of Ain Issa also provides an answer to the question of why jihadist groups in the "Syrian National Army" (SNA) with the artillery support of the Turkish Armed Forces attack this settlement. If this strategic intersection on the M-4 highway can be taken under control, another of the most important junctions of the autonomous region under the control of the SDF in north-eastern Syria will be cut off. In other words, the choice of Ain Issa as a target makes sense as an operation aimed at dividing Rojava. But the most important thing is the opportunity to increase the smuggling of oil from the Syrian fields.

[dagwolf]

A document provided in the trial of Peoples’ Democratic Party co-leader Figen Yuksekdag has refuted claims by Turkish officials and authorities that the PYD carried out terror attacks in the country, according to Dihaber News Agency.

Yuksekdag was imprisoned on terror charges in November 2016, for a speech she had made in July 2015, at the border between Turkey and Syria. In the speech the HDP co-leader had said:

“We are with those who are fighting the dark gangs calling themselves ISIS [Islamic State]. We are with the people who defended the values of humanity in Kobani and Girespi [Tell Abyad]. We are with the YPG, YPJ and PYD.”

The document in question was first presented in another case at the 4th Diyarbakir Criminal Court on 30 April 2015, after the court asked whether the PYD had been responsible for any attacks in Turkey.

Defending her client in court, lawyer Sevda Celik Ozbingol said the HDP co-leader had been targeted for being a women and because of her stance against a “regressive, monist, militarist patriarchal mentality.”

The lawyer went onto say at the time of Yuksekdag’s speech, the PYD and YPG had been engaging in discussions and diplomatic meetings with Turkish bureaucrats and officials.

“As the political climate began changing so did Turkish officials’ rhetoric,” Ozbingol said, before adding, “we asked the court for information on when the YPG and PYD had been deemed terrorist organisations, but they refused our request. There is only a two month period between the date of the document and when my client made her speech”.

Turkish officials met with PYD representatives, including co-leader Salih Muslim on several occasions as the solution process between the government and Kurdistan Workers’ Party continued between 2013 and 2015. The PYD and other groups in the de-facto autonomous administration (Rojava) in Syria also facilitated the relocation of the Suleyman Shah tomb, belonging to the father of the founder of the Ottaman Empire, in early 2015.

However, according to commentators, relations slowly began souring after it became clear that the solution process was working against the government, leading to President Erdogan putting an end to it in April 2015. Clashes resumed soon after in July.

Turkey has consistently accused the PYD of being an affiliate of the outlawed PKK and prevented it from attending international talks in Astana and Geneva. Ankara has also demanded that the US end support for groups (SDF and YPG) it says are affiliated to the popular party.

The PYD has rejected Turkey’s claims and accused the Turkish government of supporting jihadist groups in Syria as part of a wider anti-Kurdish policy.