Amuda remembers cinema martyrs, calls for truth

Child Protection Committee in al-Jazeera region said in a statement that the massacre committed by the regime via burning a cinema in Amuda is a "heinous" crime, and called for truth to expose all practices of injustice and aggression against the peoples of the region.

13 November, 2020 11:31

NEWS DESK

Child Protection Committee and Women Body in al-Jazeera region recalled the 60^th anniversary of Amuda cinema massacre which claimed the life of more than 280 children from Amuda, the majority of whom were from the Kurdish component, after the Syrian government security forces set fire to the cinema in 1960.

Dozens of martyrs' families and a number of members of Kongra Star, Child Protection Committee, Culture and Art, in addition to a number of residents of Amuda district participated in the activity which was organized in Martyrs Park in Amuda district of Qamishlo city.

At the beginning of the event, the children placed roses on the statue in the park, which expresses the children who were burned in the cinema, and then the statement of Child Protection Committee in al-Jazeera region was read by the child Judy, and the text of the statement included:

"On the third of November 1960, when a film was being shown, the profits of which were delivered to the Algerian revolution at the time, and the film was shown three times, each time the cinema got full of children. During the presentation of the film, fire broke out in the walls and ceiling of the hall on orders of the regime, and within minutes 283 children out of 500 children were martyred inside the cinema which could only accommodate 120 children.

In less than half an hour, the flaming roof collapsed, the children's bodies turned to ashes, and those corpses that screamed at the top of their voice were deformed and even their heroic savior, the martyr Mohamed Saeed al-Dakouri, was burned. Their remains were buried collectively in Sharmola Cemetery, most of them were Kurdish children.

On the human level, the massacre of Amuda cinema fire is considered a heinous crime, as no family in the city remained without a martyr, burned, or mutilated.

Sixty years passed and the smell of smoke still wafts on this day, the sounds of their cries leave an echo in Amuda which will not calm down until the truth is revealed to the public to expose all practices of injustice and aggression against the peoples of the region, and hold accountable everyone who had a hand in the perpetration of this ancient massacre present in our minds. A generation of youth of future turned to ashes, from which a generation carrying the banner of freedom and peace could have been created.

The commemoration concluded by recounting a verse of poetry expressing the martyrs of Amuda massacre.

D.H

ANHA