The Afrin-Syria Human Rights Organization stated that in Afrin, which has been occupied by the Turkish state and its gangs since 2018, 4 citizens were killed and 27 people, including 6 women and a girl, were abducted in February.

According to the statement, two people were killed during the bombardment of the Turkish state gangs against Shêrawa and Shehba areas and one person was killed by Turkish soldiers. The fourth person was a citizen who died of a nervous breakdown while his trees were being cut down by the gangs.

The statement said that 5 Syrian refugee students who were forcibly settled in the Mabata district of Afrin attacked a local student named Şiyar İbrahim with a knife.

The Human Rights Organization also reported that ecocide continues in the region and that more than 200 olive and other trees were cut down in Mabata district, 600 cherry trees were uprooted in Bêk Obasî village and many trees were uprooted in Bilbilê district.

The organization also reported ongoing construction of colonial houses in Kafr Sefera village with the support of the "Gaza Support" organization and in Kafr Romê village with the support of the Yed El Ewn organization.

The occupation forces had massacred 4 people and abducted more than 50 people in Afrin in January.

Background

Afrin Canton was the westernmost canton of Rojava and North and East Syria, home to 200,000 ethnic Kurds. Though the population was overwhelmingly Kurdish, it was home to diverse religious groups including Yazidis, Alawites and Christians alongside Sunni Muslims.

On 20 January 2018, Turkey launched air strikes on 100 locations in Afrin, as the onset of an invasion they dubbed ‘Operation Olive Branch.’

The Turkish Air Force indiscriminately shelled civilians as well as YPG/YPJ positions, while a ground assault was carried out by factions and militias organised under the umbrella of the Turkish-backed National Army.

By 15 March, Turkish-backed militias had encircled Afrin city and placed it under artillery bombardment. A Turkish airstrike struck the city’s only functioning hospital, killing 16 civilians.

Civilians fled and the SDF retreated, and by 18 March Turkey was in de facto occupation of Afrin. Between 400 and 500 civilians died in the invasion, overwhelmingly as a result of Turkish bombing. Other civilians were summarily executed in the field.

Prior to the Turkish invasion, Afrin had been one of the most peaceful and secure parts of Syria, virtually never seeing combat during the civil war bar occasional skirmishes between YPG/YPJ and jihadist forces on its borders. As a result, Afrin offered peaceful sanctuary to over 300,000 internally displaced people from elsewhere in Syria.