Hamid al-Abed: Reports IDPs’ return are groundless, removal of occupier is everyone's demand

Hamid al-Abed, the co-chair of Girê Spi / Tel Abyad Provincial Council, told our agency reporters in an interview about the situation of people displaced by the Turkish aggression and whether they monitored the return of IDPs to the occupied territories as reported by the United Nations.

"We have not monitored any returns of IDPs to the occupied territories"

Since the beginning of the Turkish attack on the area of Girê Spi / Tal Abyad and its countryside, the displacement wave from the city of Tel Abyad and Suluk until Ain Issa in the south has started, which led them to prepare statistics and provide possible assistance, he said.

"There have been cases of internal displacement in the areas occupied by Turkey for civilians present there under the pretext that they are areas of engagement, and the aim was robbery and theft."

Commenting on UN reports that thousands of displaced people have returned to their areas, Hamid al-Abed said: “We are the people of the region and we have contacts with the people who are there. The displacement is still going on and what the Turkish occupation and its mercenaries are promoting is that the return of the people to their areas is completely groundless.''

"There have been some cases of individual returns to those who have joined the FSA and some organizations working in the region after rumors of regime forces entering the area and those who wanted fled the regime to those areas for fear of it," he said.

Hameed Al-Abed continued by stressing that "the majority have returned after clarifying the agreements that took place between the Syrian army and the Syrian Democratic Forces, which refuted all the rumors promoted, and led to regime’s deployment in some points in border areas."

He considered that the United Nations should scrutinize its reports and follow the transparency of humanitarian affairs, stressing that 14 families from the area occupied by Turkey displaced on 21 of this month to the northern countryside of Raqqa.

The co-chairman of Girê Spi / Tel Abyad Provincial Council said that the statistics reported in the UN report included the families of the mercenaries who had been admitted to the city of Gire Spi, and Turkey is working to settle them in the region.

'Number of the IDPs exceeds 50,000'

"We, the residents of the region, will not accept what Turkey and its mercenaries are doing. We, as an administration, had sent letters of invitation to the children of Syria abroad to return, but they refused," he said."

He asked, "Is it just to settle Ghouta people in Tel Abyad after displacing its people to other areas, we must reconsider and move about what is happening."

Speaking on the humanitarian issue and displaced people, Hamid al-Abed said that "the total number of displaced people of Tel Abyad exceeded 50,000, the majority of them are in Raqqa and the town of al-Heisha."

He noted that census operations are continuing in Kobani, Serin, Tabqa and Manbij, stressing that the numbers are increasing because the displacement situation continues.

"Organizations do not respond to the needs of the displaced and the demand of the displaced is to remove the occupier."

Al-Abed said they had called on humanitarian organizations to act on the deteriorating humanitarian situation of the displaced, but had received no response.

He explained that the demand of all displaced people from the occupied areas is to return to their homes and do not need a basket of relief or material assistance, and their only demand is to remove the occupier from their land and secure their return to it.

He considered that the stance of the United Nations and the international community as shameful for the people who presented 11,000 martyrs as they fought ISIS on behalf of humanity which did nothing when the people were invaded by Turkey.

Hamid al-Abed concluded by saying that international organizations did not fulfill their humanitarian duty towards the displaced people in the region and did not respond to the required level. "We are counting on ourselves and on the Autonomous Administration and its councils to help the displaced," he said. To the displaced in the region, while the international organizations are making excuses to escape its humanitarian responsibilities in the region."

J.O

ANHA