ISIL 'tightens grip' on Kobani
- 10 years ago
ISIL has further tightened its stranglehold on the Syrian town of Kobani – a monitoring group says – as Turkish tanks on the border look on without intervening.
It is infuriating for Kurds who want more than just US-led coalition air strikes on the extremists who now control at least 40 per cent of Kobani, including key Kurdish administrative buildings – according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
As Kurds at the border town of Surac held a funeral for ten kinsmen killed in the fighting, UN envoy Staffan de Mistura backed Kurdish calls for volunteers to be allowed into Syria to defend Kobani from ISIL.
But one of the Kurdish mourners, Sari Ozcelik, said Turkey was stopping that from happening.
“They have surrounded us with tanks and isolated us here. The Turkish government won’t allow us to cross,” he said.
Some 200,000 people, mostly Syrian Kurds, have fled the fighting across this border.
A government official in Kobani, Faysal now lives in a tent in Turkey with members of his family.
“We saw with our own eyes how they are killing children, kidnapping women and selling them in markets,” he said.
“What kind of person does this? And they call us unbelievers? I want them to explain to me what an unbeliever is. They tell us, we have forgotten our religion. But they are the ones who has misinterpreted religion, not us.”
His life turned upside down, Faysal has no idea what the future holds for his family including his brother, still trapped in Kobani as ISIL’s grip on the town grows.
It is infuriating for Kurds who want more than just US-led coalition air strikes on the extremists who now control at least 40 per cent of Kobani, including key Kurdish administrative buildings – according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
As Kurds at the border town of Surac held a funeral for ten kinsmen killed in the fighting, UN envoy Staffan de Mistura backed Kurdish calls for volunteers to be allowed into Syria to defend Kobani from ISIL.
But one of the Kurdish mourners, Sari Ozcelik, said Turkey was stopping that from happening.
“They have surrounded us with tanks and isolated us here. The Turkish government won’t allow us to cross,” he said.
Some 200,000 people, mostly Syrian Kurds, have fled the fighting across this border.
A government official in Kobani, Faysal now lives in a tent in Turkey with members of his family.
“We saw with our own eyes how they are killing children, kidnapping women and selling them in markets,” he said.
“What kind of person does this? And they call us unbelievers? I want them to explain to me what an unbeliever is. They tell us, we have forgotten our religion. But they are the ones who has misinterpreted religion, not us.”
His life turned upside down, Faysal has no idea what the future holds for his family including his brother, still trapped in Kobani as ISIL’s grip on the town grows.