Armed groups of Nubl and Al-Zahra impose suffocating siege on 6 villages in Sherawa

After the Turkish occupation of Afrin on March 18, 2018, the villages of (Burj Al-Qas, Klotia, gundê Mazen, Bashmara, Zaranita, Mayassa) of the Sherawa district, southeast of the occupied canton of Afrin, remained besieged by the Turkish occupation army on the one hand, and the Damascus government forces and armed groups in my towns  Nubl and Zahraa on the other hand.

For more than 4 years, the Turkish occupation and these groups have imposed a suffocating siege on more than 10,000 people in the aforementioned villages.

But the armed groups in the towns of Nubl and Al-Zahraa, which are affiliated with the Damascus government, have recently tightened the siege on the 6 besieged villages in Sherawa, to the extent that they prevent the people from leaving and entering these villages.

Citizen Yahya Suleiman from the village of Burj al-Qas, said in an interview with our agency, by phone, “For more than a month, armed groups in the towns of Nubl and Zahraa, which are affiliated with the Damascus government, have prevented the entry of foodstuffs, medicine and fuel to our besieged villages in Shirawa district from the eastern side, and the Turkish occupation army and its mercenaries are imposing a siege on it from the western side."

He stressed that "the armed groups in the town of Nubl and al-Zahra confiscated cars and motorcycles of the people, while they were heading to the villages of al-Shahba canton to buy their daily necessities."

In his speech, Yahya indicated that the besieged villages lack food, bread and fuel, in addition to running out of medicines at the Kurdish Red Crescent medical point in Burj al-Qas village.

Yahya indicated that patients cannot go to Afrin Hospital and Tel Rifaat to receive treatment due to the siege, in addition to the high costs of transportation from impassable roads, which amount to 200,000 Syrian pounds. The impassable road is monitored by the Turkish occupation army and its mercenaries stationed in the village of Kemar  occupied in Shirawa district.

It is worth noting that the people of the 6 besieged villages in Sherawa district had helped the people of Nubl and Al-Zahra towns and transported food and medicine on their shoulders or on the backs of animals, during the siege on them by mercenary groups and Jabhat al-Nusra in 2014.

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 ANHA