ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Thousands of Kurds have been arrested and kidnapped while hundreds of others were killed since Turkey seized control of Afrin city in northwest Syria, a conflict monitor said on Friday as the invasion marks its fourth year. At least 639 Kurds, including 95 children and 86 women were killed in “IED explosions, car bombs, airstrikes, ground bombardment by Turkish forces, and executions,” the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) with a ground network in Syria reported. Some civilians also died under torture in prisons run by Turkish-backed forces, it added. The Turkish forces and their Syrian proxies launched Operation Olive Branch on January 20, 2018, in Afrin. Ankara seized control of the city from the People’s Protection Units (YPG) on March 24. Over 7,000 Kurds from Afrin were kidnapped and arrested since the invasion, reported SOHR, with that around 1,300 of them remaining in prison. “For four years of the occupation of Afrin city and surrounding districts, Turkish forces and their proxy Syrian factions have wreaked havoc and committed a plethora of heinous crimes breaching all international conventions and charters and human rights laws,” SOHR stated in its report. Seeking sanctuary, thousands of indigenous Kurds were forced to flee Afrin to Kurdish-controlled areas in northeast Syria (Rojava) when Ankara invaded the city. The conflict forced over 310,000 families to flee the area, SOHR said. Turkish-backed groups have been widely accused of human rights violations against Afrin’s locals, including kidnap, looting and extortion. Over 580 people including women and teenagers were arrested in Afrin last year. A graphic video of a civilian being tortured by Turkish-backed forces in Afrin circulated on social media in September. In August 2018, Amnesty International reported that “Afrin residents are enduring widespread human rights violations, mostly at the hands of Syrian armed groups equipped and armed by Turkey.” In its annual report for 2019, Amnesty documented a “wide range of abuses” against Afrin’s civilians at the hands of Turkish-backed groups, including the arbitrary detention of more than 50 locals.
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