Syrians Dream of Crossing Turkish Border to Get to Europe

The Turkish border seen from the town of Al-Darbasiyah, north of Syria (Asharq Al-Awsat)
The Turkish border seen from the town of Al-Darbasiyah, north of Syria (Asharq Al-Awsat)
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Syrians Dream of Crossing Turkish Border to Get to Europe

The Turkish border seen from the town of Al-Darbasiyah, north of Syria (Asharq Al-Awsat)
The Turkish border seen from the town of Al-Darbasiyah, north of Syria (Asharq Al-Awsat)

For Syrians, crossing the border into Turkey has become a core solution to escaping the hell raised in war-torn Syria. Running away from a decade of war, many Syrians hope that by crossing into Turkey, they will have a better life in their final destination, Europe.

In some cases, monitored by Asharq Al-Awsat, Turkish border guards showed unmatched cruelty in their methods used to stop Syrians from crossing into Turkey. Dozens of Syrians, including women and children, were subject to beating and torture.

Turkish guards have even resorted to tossing Syrians off high altitudes while they were trying to cross the border.

Last August, civil bodies and human rights organizations documented the killing of six Syrian civilians, including a child.

According to data collected by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based war monitor, at least 26 civilians, including a woman and six children, have been killed in Idlib and Hasaka governorates since the beginning of 2021.

This brings the death toll to about 500 civilians who have died trying to cross the border into Turkey since the spring of 2011.

On the eve of August 30, Salar Adnan Othman, who is a local from Qamishli, a city in northeastern Syria on the Syria-Turkey border, was killed by Turkish guards, leaving his parents with nothing but pictures to remind them of their son.

“That night, after 45 minutes had passed, the (Kurdish) Autonomous Administration’s border security forces called us and said that they had taken Salar to the hospital in the town of Amuda,” Othman’s father told Asharq Al-Awsat.

After taking x-rays and doing tests, Othman evidently was found to be severely beaten at the hands of the Turkish gendarmerie.

Because of his critical condition, he was immediately transferred to the central hospital in Qamishli, where he died because of his severe injuries.

Despite the danger involved in the journey, the Syrian-Turkish border has recently recorded a spike in the number of civilians attempting to smuggle their way into Turkey.



Sudan Army Says Recaptures Key State Capital

Sudanese civilians displaced by offensive south of Khartoum earlier this year dream of returning to their homes after the regular army retakes territory - AFP
Sudanese civilians displaced by offensive south of Khartoum earlier this year dream of returning to their homes after the regular army retakes territory - AFP
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Sudan Army Says Recaptures Key State Capital

Sudanese civilians displaced by offensive south of Khartoum earlier this year dream of returning to their homes after the regular army retakes territory - AFP
Sudanese civilians displaced by offensive south of Khartoum earlier this year dream of returning to their homes after the regular army retakes territory - AFP

The Sudanese army said Saturday it had retaken a key state capital south of Khartoum from rival Rapid Support Forces who had held it for the past five months.

The Sennar state capital of Sinja is a strategic prize in the 19-month-old war between the regular army and the RSF as it lies on a key road linking army-controlled areas of eastern and central Sudan.

It posted footage on social media that it said had been filmed inside the main base in the city.

"Sinja has returned to the embrace of the nation," the information minister of the army-backed government, Khaled al-Aiser, said in a statement.

Aiser's office said armed forces chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan had travelled to the city of Sennar, 60 kilometres (40 miles) to the north, on Saturday to "inspect the operation and celebrate the liberation of Sinja", AFP reported.

The RSF had taken the two cities in a lightning offensive in June that saw nearly 726,000 civilians flee, according to UN figures.

Human rights groups have said that those who were unwilling or unable to leave have faced months of arbitrary violence by RSF fighters.

Sinja teacher Abdullah al-Hassan spoke of his "indescribable joy" at seeing the army enter the city after "months of terror".

"At any moment, you were waiting for militia fighters to barge in and beat you or loot you," the 53-year-old told AFP by telephone.

Both sides in the Sudanese conflict have been accused of war crimes, including indiscriminately shelling homes, markets and hospitals.

The RSF has also been accused of summary executions, systematic sexual violence and rampant looting.

The RSF control nearly all of the vast western region of Darfur as well as large swathes of Kordofan in the south. They also hold much of the capital Khartoum and the key farming state of Al-Jazira to its south.

Since April 2023, the war has killed tens of thousands of people and uprooted more than 11 million -- creating what the UN says is the world's largest displacement crisis.

From the eastern state of Gedaref -- where more than 1.1 million displaced people have sought refuge -- Asia Khedr, 46, said she hoped her family's ordeal might soon be at an end.

"We'll finally go home and say goodbye to this life of displacement and suffering," she told AFP.