UN accuses SDF of possible war crimes

[Anthea]

SDF launches investigation

UN accuses force of possible war crimes: Mazloum Abdi

The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) have begun an internal investigation into their alleged violations in northeast Syria, said the general commander on Thursday, after a new UN report accused the force of possibly committing war crimes.

"We confirm that we have launched an investigation into the cases mentioned in the [UN] report,” said general commander Mazloum Abdi in a tweet on Thursday.

Released on Tuesday, the UN Commission on Syria report claims the SDF and other affiliated forces have “detained and tortured civilians, and continued to use children in military roles” during the first half of 2020.

“The Commission documented eight cases of arbitrary detention of civil society workers, political activists and persons of Arab ethnicity by the Syrian Democratic Forces and affiliated Kurdish People’s Protection Units/Women’s Protection Units, including by their military intelligence,” reads the report, adding that most of the cases interviewed by the Commission did not have access to legal representation.

One of the examples mentioned by the report is of a member of an Arab tribe who was allegedly held by SDF in several prisons for a year for his alleged collaboration with Turkey. “The majority of time in detention had been spent in solitary confinement, with minimal food and water, and he had been regularly beaten by Syrian Democratic Forces military intelligence.”

The report also mentions another case of a political activist who was detained by the SDF in Hasaka prison in November 2019 and allegedly brutally beaten.

“He was regularly beaten and suffered a broken rib. The interviewee described being hung with his arms behind his back and kept in that position from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m., resulting in paralysis to a number of fingers. He alleged that he had been tortured, including by electrocution and having weights attached to his genitals. Threats of rape had also been made,” claims the report.

The UN Commission also accuses the SDF and its affiliated forces of recruiting children.

Abdi did not mention the child recruitment allegation, but the SDF has previously denied it.

The report states that the SDF’s alleged violations may amount to the severity of war crimes.

“The Commission finds that there are reasonable grounds to believe that members of the Syrian Democratic Forces and related entities may have committed the war crime of cruel treatment and ill-treatment of those deprived of liberty in military intelligence facilities.”

SDF is a multi-national force, mostly consisting of the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG). It is the only ally of the Global Coalition against the Islamic State (ISIS) on the ground in Syria. Its political arm, Syrian Democratic Council (SDC), governs the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (NES) which is also known by Kurds as Rojava.

NES welcomed the Commission's report, saying it includes "factual information."

Regarding the alleged violations committed by the SDF, the NES said that it would "carry out tasks and follow up on what was stated in the report within a direct action plan.”

“Serious action”

The Commission report also accused fighters in the Turkish-backed Syrian National Army to have committed multiple war crimes in areas of northern Syria, since seizing control of the area from Kurdish fighters. It called on Turkey to do more to rein in its proxy militias and prevent violations in the areas it controls.

In early 2018, Turkey launched Operation Olive Branch in Afrin, a Kurdish enclave in the northwest corner of Syria. In the fall of 2019, Turkey began a new operation, Peace Spring, against Kurdish forces along the border. The campaign ended with ceasefires brokered by Washington and Moscow that saw the SDF pull back from the border and around the towns of Sari Kani and Gire Spi (Tel Abyad in Arabic).

Abdi said in his tweet Thursday that the part of the UN Commission’s report about Turkey is just a “small part of the war crimes” conducted by the armed forces against people in Afrin, Sari Kani [Ras al-Ain] and Tal Abyad [Gire Spi].

He called on the international community to hold the perpetrators accountable and “take serious action to chase and prosecute the perpetrators of these crimes.”

https://www.rudaw.net/english/middleeast/syria/17092020