Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafieh Neighborhoods Council calls for steadfastness in Turkish occupation policy face

February 16 marks the anniversary of the violent attacks on Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafieh in 2016, which killed hundreds of civilians. On this occasion, the General Council of Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafieh neighborhoods today made a statement to the public, read in Arabic by the Deputy Co-Chair of the General Council of Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafieh Neighborhoods Arin Hanan, and Kurdish by the co-head of the Yazidi House in Aleppo Manan Jaafar, near the Martyr Bakour point on Al-Mukhabarat Street, in the presence of representatives of civil institutions and political parties as well as the residents of the neighborhood who participated in the resistance.

The statement pointed out that: "The neighborhoods of Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafieh, which are a model of coexistence between all components, were subjected to indiscriminate shelling and a suffocating siege by the forces of the former Syrian regime and the mercenaries of the Turkish occupation, who used internationally banned chemical weapons in an attempt to create a new genocide against the people."

The statement stressed that: "The resistance turned the two neighborhoods into an impregnable fortress, which withstood successive attacks since 2012 against the Baathist regime, through 2013, and up to 2016 when it was attacked by mercenaries of the Turkish occupation."

The statement also recalled "the martyrs of freedom, whether combatants or civilians, who fell in defense of the neighborhoods of Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafieh and the values and principles they believed in in the framework of the people's revolutionary war."

And pointed out that recent days have witnessed the circulation of news about new schemes hatched against the neighborhood under the guidance of Turkish intelligence, aimed at targeting the neighborhood's checkpoints and creating strife among the people.

The statement called on "the Syrian people and national political forces to condemn these attacks and violations committed by the mercenaries of the Turkish occupation, while holding the Damascus government responsible for these terrorist acts, and called on the people of Sheikh Maqsoud and Ashrafieh neighborhoods and the people of Aleppo in general to unite and withstand the policy of aggression, and to resist all schemes aimed at destabilizing the region."

Annd called on "the United Nations and the international community to shoulder their responsibilities to deter Turkish aggression and stop its crimes against civilians."

Sh-S

ANHA