A roundup of the coverage of the struggle for human rights and freedoms, from Mexico to Hong Kong
Continue reading...Category Archives: Kurds
Lives lost at Europe’s borders and Afghan MPs in exile: human rights this fortnight – in pictures
A roundup of the struggle for human rights and freedoms, from Mexico to Manila
Continue reading...Channel drownings unlikely to slow exodus from Iraqi Kurdistan
As officials grapple with crisis, even more Kurds are preparing to make dangerous journey to Europe
Were they driven to the freezing shores of Europe by desperation, or did several thousand Kurds instead make the dangerous journey in search of opportunity?
As officials in Iraqi Kurdistan grapple with what is driving a crisis that is thought to have led to scores of citizens drowning in the Channel on Wednesday, and thousands of others to brave precarious migrant routes to Europe, even more are preparing to leave.
Continue reading...Migrant caravan and Qatar’s tarnished World Cup: human rights this fortnight – in pictures
A roundup of the struggle for human rights and freedoms, from Pakistan to Poland
Continue reading...Turkey jails Kurdish politician’s wife over miscarriage form ‘typo’
Başak Demirtaş and her doctor sentenced over ‘falsified’ medical report on her miscarriage
The wife of a jailed Kurdish politician has been sentenced to two and a half years in a Turkish prison over a typo in a medical report on a miscarriage, in a case denounced as an “appalling” political persecution.
A court in Diyarbakır handed down sentences of 30 months each for Başak Demirtaş, a teacher, and her doctor on Thursday for submitting a falsified medical report, a local Kurdish news agency reported.
Continue reading...‘The court of God will be waiting for him’: Iraqis react to Colin Powell’s death
A country still struggling with the aftermath of a disastrous occupation has a mixed opinion of the former general
For many Iraqis, Colin Powell was the face of the US invasion which caused an estimated 200,000 deaths, unleashing nearly two decades of domestic chaos and precipitating turmoil throughout the region.
His death, at the age of 84, was unlamented by many in a country still grappling with the aftermath of a disastrous occupation and an Islamist insurgency that followed the 2003 war – a conflict that Powell himself was later to acknowledge as a stain on his legacy.
Continue reading...Turnout at Iraqi national election as low as 25% as many boycott polls
Disillusioned youth and middle classes stay home rather than vote for system they believe has failed
Iraqis have turned out in low numbers in a national election, with many boycotting a poll that people feared could reinforce a political system that had failed them.
Nationwide turnout at the sixth ballot since the ousting of Saddam Hussein in 2003 was thought to be as low as 25%, with the country’s disillusioned youth and middle classes largely staying home.
Continue reading...Came to fight, stayed for the freedom: why more Kurdish women are taking up arms
All-female militias in Syria have swelled in numbers in response to Turkish incursions. The comradeship and life outside traditional gender roles is proving appealing to many
Zeynab Serekaniye, a Kurdish woman with a gap-toothed smile and a warm demeanor, never imagined she’d join a militia.
The 26-year-old grew up in Ras al-Ayn, a town in north-east Syria. The only girl in a family of five, she liked to fight and wear boys’ clothing. But when her brothers got to attend school and she did not, Serekaniye did not challenge the decision. She knew it was the reality for girls in the region. Ras al-Ayn, Arabic for “head of the spring”, was a green and placid place, so Serekaniye settled down to a life of farming vegetables with her mother.
Continue reading...Six children killed in Syria shelling
Artillery fired from government-controlled area kills eight civilians and injures others in Idlib province
Artillery fire from government-controlled territory and airstrikes killed at least eight civilians in Syria’s last rebel enclave on Saturday, most of them children, rescue workers and a war monitor said.
The shelling in Ibleen, a village in the southern Idlib province, hit the home of Subhi al-Assi, killing him, his wife and three of his children in their sleep, according to the rescue service known as White Helmets and Idlib’s health directorate. Al-Assi was an administrator in a local health centre.
Continue reading...Assad forces’ shelling in Syria causes 5,000 civilians to flee
At least 31 people killed since start of June amid government attacks on Idlib area
About 5,000 civilians in the north-west of Syria have been forced to flee their homes after more government shelling targeting the contested area, a local aid agency said.
At least 31 people have died since the beginning of June, victims of Bashar al-Assad’s forces hitting civilian buildings in southern Idlib province. The buildings included a hospital, displacement camp school, and a White Helmets headquarters. The number of dead includes three children and a civil defence worker who was killed in an attack on the town of Qastoun on Saturday.
Continue reading...The short life and long journey of Artin, found dead on Norway beach
Friend of 15-month-old’s family reveals details of Channel smuggling trade that led to their deaths
The authorities in Norway did not have much to go on when they found the body on the shore on New Year’s Day. But the baby boy was wearing a jacket – navy blue with white stitching.
And that helped them solve the mystery of what had happened to 15-month-old Artin Iran Nezhad, who had last been seen weeks before and hundreds of miles away.
Continue reading...Body found in Norway of 15-month-old boy who died crossing Channel
Artin, previously listed as missing, died alongside his Iranian-Kurdish relatives when boat sank last October
A body that was found on a Norwegian shore several months ago has been identified as that of a 15-month-old child named Artin, who died alongside his relatives as they tried to cross the Channel to start a new life in the UK last October, local police have said.
The body was found near Karmøy in south-west Norway on New Year’s Day – more than two months after the vessel carrying the Iranian Kurds Rasul Iran Nezhad, Shiva Mohammad Panahi and their three children sank.
Continue reading...‘Kill the bill’ and trans visibility: human rights this fortnight in pictures
A round-up of the coverage on struggles for human rights and freedoms, from Mexico to China
Continue reading...Kurds in ‘mountain prison’ cower as Turkey fights PKK with drones in Iraq
As decades-old battle intensifies, civilians count cost in lives and livelihoods
It took 10 days to find Muhsin Speri’s body. The 64-year-old had left his town in the mountains of Iraqi Kurdistan along with friends Hassan Sadiq and Safar Sini on a dry, windy day in December last year to fish and forage for wild honey and mushrooms.
Life in the Amedi region of the Zagros mountains is hard and physical, but the area has been home to Kurdish and Assyrian communities in sync with the rhythms of the mountains for thousands of years. Many locals like to roam and camp for several days at a time, but after Speri’s family failed to reach him by phone for more than a week, a search party was launched.
Continue reading...Kurdish forces enter detention camp in Syria to eliminate Isis cells
At least 5,000 troops and police begin security operation to tackle growing threat from sleeper groups
Kurdish forces in north-east Syria have begun a security operation inside al-Hawl detention camp in an attempt to eliminate Isis sleeper cells that have become increasingly active over the last few months.
Around 5,000–6,000 Kurdish troops and Asayish security police, led by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) military, entered the camp on Sunday to conduct searches and arrests in what is expected to be a 15-day operation.
Continue reading...Erdoğan vows to expand fight against PKK after deaths of 13 hostages
More than 700 alleged supporters of Kurdish militants held following failed attempt to rescue Turkish soldiers and police
The Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has vowed to expand operations against the Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) as the fallout from the deaths of 13 Turkish soldiers and police officers abducted by the militant group continued to reverberate at home and abroad.
The bodies of 13 victims, 12 shot in the head and one who died of a bullet wound to his shoulder, were discovered in a cave complex in Gare in Kurdish-run northern Iraq during a Turkish military operation designed to free them, officials said on Sunday. The PKK said the hostages had been killed in Turkish airstrikes.
Continue reading...‘If a smuggler says do it, you do’: refugees on trying to rescue their friends from the Channel
Two Kurdish asylum seekers made frantic attempts to save lives of family whose boat capsized in rough conditions
Two asylum seekers who were in the same boat as a Kurdish Iranian family who drowned trying to cross the Channel have spoken out about their frantic attempts to save the family’s lives after the vessel capsized.
Rasul Iran Nezhad, his wife, Shiva Mohammad Panahi, both 35, and their children: Anita, nine, Armin, six, and 15-month-old Artin, were among 22 people who boarded the boat, a rigid polyester structure about 20ft long, in October.
Continue reading...Art as resistance: exiled Kurdish artist’s daring Istanbul show
Zehra Doğan spent nearly three years in Turkish jails and smuggled out her works as dirty laundry
An exiled artist who spent almost three years in jail in Turkey is shining a light on Kurdish feminism with a daring exhibition of works she created while behind bars.
Zehra Doğan was among the thousands of people who have been caught up in arrests and detentions in Turkey since the 2016 attempted coup against President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s government. Those detained are accused of either supporting the Gülenist movement, blamed for the failed putsch, or the Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK), a militant group, both of which are outlawed.
Continue reading...The Guardian view on Tories and migration: stop the posing | Editorial
The drowning of a family of five in the Channel and a fire on a ship off the coast of Senegal should prompt action – ‘thoughts and prayers’ are not enough
“We don’t see migration as a problem at all: we see people dying at sea as a problem and the existence of the mafias as a problem.” Such was the view expressed last week by Hana Jalloul, secretary of state for migration in Spain. Days earlier, more than 140 people had died off the coast of Senegal, after their ship caught fire and capsized, in the deadliest shipwreck recorded this year. Ms Jalloul spoke of efforts to support the regional government of the Canary Islands, which is struggling to cope with the number of arrivals, and stressed her determination to combat organised crime. She also pointed to migrants’ crucial role in Spanish life, including as care workers during the pandemic.
British politicians could profit from studying her example in the aftermath of the drowning of a family of four Kurdish Iranians in the Channel. (A fifth member of the same family, aged 15 months, is missing and presumed dead.) Reports of the deaths of Rasul Iran Nezhad, Shiva Mohammad Panahi and their children drew forth platitudes from the home secretary, Priti Patel, about “thoughts and prayers”. But nothing said by her or Boris Johnson did anything to dispel the impression that their attitude to people trying to reach the UK to seek asylum is chiefly antagonistic. While Ms Patel repeated her opposition to “callous criminals exploiting vulnerable people”, there was no serious attempt to sympathise with the migrants’ desperation – or acknowledge that their reliance on smugglers is a matter not of accident but of political choice.
Continue reading...Four Iranians who died crossing Channel were part of same family
Rasul Iran Nezhad and Shiva Mohammad Panahi drowned along with their children Anita and Armin
Four Iranian Kurds who died trying to cross the Channel in high winds were members of one family who paid smugglers thousands of euros after two failed attempts to reach Britain, the Guardian has been told.
Rasul Iran Nezhad and his wife, Shiva Mohammad Panahi, both 35, and two of their children, Anita, nine, and Armin, six, drowned as they tried to reach Britain by boat, according to a relative of the family and the Iranian-Kurdish human rights organisation Hengaw.
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