Afrin car bomb kills one, injures four

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — One person was killed and four people were injured in a car bombing in the northwestern Syrian region of Afrin on Tuesday, local media reported.

The blast took place near the entrance to the town of Kafr Jannah, in close vicinity to pro-Turkish military checkpoints, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported. The car was on its way to Afrin, according to North Press Agency.

Afrin is a Kurdish-majority region in Syria’s northwest. Kurdish forces of the People’s Protection Units (YPG) took control of the area after regime forces re-deployed to defend Arab-majority areas against rebels after the start of the Syrian uprising in 2011. 

Turkey and its Syrian proxies invaded Afrin in March 2018, forcing hundreds of thousands of people – mostly Kurds – to flee to other areas controlled by the YPG, especially Shahba, north of Aleppo. Since the invasion, there have been several explosions and car bombings in the Afrin region and the YPG has sporadically clashed with Turkish-backed militias who are accused of committing war crimes.

Last week the al-Shifaa hospital in Afrin was attacked. Twenty-one people were killed, 17 of them civilians. Turkey blamed the YPG, but the force denied any responsibility.

The YPG “unreservedly condemns this attack on a hospital. Our forces has never targeted civilians and we are firmly opposed to any military method risking civilian lives and infrastructure in conflict zones,” YPG spokesperson Nuri Mahmoud said on Monday.