Syria conflict: Kurds urge humanitarian corridor to evacuate dead and wounded

Kurdish authorities have called for a humanitarian corridor along the frontline of the battle with Turkish forces in northern Syria, saying hundreds of civilians and teams of medics were trapped within the ferocious fighting.

The call for help came amid claims by Isis that its fighters had managed to free female detainees from prisons and centres in the middle of the fighting.

Kurdish authorities have warned they are unable to adequately hold some 10,000 captured fighters, of which around 1,000 hail from European countries, as their forces have been redirected to the front.

The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces, which is fighting Turkey, admitted to losing control of at least one camp holding hundreds of Isis family members.

Kurdish health officials told The Independent, meanwhile, they need a humanitarian corridor from the border town of Ra al-Ayn, which is the epicentre of Turkey’s incursion, to Tal Tamer, 40km south.

Hundreds of civilians and at least three medical teams are currently encircled by fighting and unable to get out, Dr Sherman Berry, a spokesman for Kurdish Red Crescent said. 

Similar pleas were released by local health ministry officials who said they needed assistance evacuating “dead and wounded civilians” from Ras al-Ayn.

In the statement, the ministry urged foreign powers including the US-led coalition, and Russia, to intervene to get them out.

“We need a humanitarian corridor urgently because hundreds of civilians and several medical teams are stuck in areas completely surrounded by the fighting,” Dr Berry told The Independent.

“Two medics from the Kurdish Red Crescent were injured while a health ministry ambulance was hit near to Ras al-Ayn killing one – we don’t have access to them,” he added.

Turkey denied claims that it was targeting civilians.

In a statement released by the Turkish presidential office on Wednesday, Turkish officials said that “the Turkish Armed Forces and the Syrian National Army are conducting an extremely meticulous operation without inflicting even slightest harm to civilians, and showing maximum efforts that historical, cultural and religious assets and infrastructure come to no harm.”

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), a UK-based monitoring group, said on Wednesday at least 300,000 people have been displaced and 71 civilians had been killed in Syria since Turkey launched its cross-border incursion last Wednesday.

However, the health authority of the Kurdish-led administration in the region put the civilian death toll at 218, including 21 children, on Thursday.

The fighting erupted last week when Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced a cross border offensive into northern Syria against Kurdish forces which Ankara labels terrorists for its ties to Turkish outlawed group the PKK.

Mr Erdogan said that he aimed to build a 30km-deep buffer zone and would relocate millions of Syrian refugees in Turkey there.

US President Donald Trump was accused of “green lighting” the incursion, after he released a statement saying US troops, who had been fighting alongside the Kurds against Isis, would pull back and not hinder an imminent Turkish attack.

He later ordered the complete withdrawal of all 1,000 US troops from Syria and slapped sanctions on Turkey.

Outgunned, the Kurds struck a controversial deal with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who agreed to send troops into northern Syria to defend the border, marking the first-time government forces have had access to the area in at least five years.

But the arrival of the regime, backed by Russian forces, sparked the sudden exodus of approximately 300 foreign aid workers, partially or fully suspending some activities.

They fear arrest or worse, as many organisations are not recognised by the Syrian government.

The Kurdish Red Crescent told The Independent on Wednesday they were unable to cope with the hundreds of injured and hundreds of thousands of displaced on their own.

With the death toll and number of displaced soaring, even the Kremlin spoke out.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called on Turkey to keep its offensive in northern Syria “proportional”.

“We respect Turkey’s right to undertake measures for its own security, but we trust that the operation will be proportional to this very purpose – ensuring security and tasks around ensuring security,” Peskov said.

The fighting has also sparked fears of the resurgence of Isis, who have exploited the chaos to attack jails and camps where their supporters and family members are held. 

On Thursday Isis claimed via its news agency Amaq it had managed to free a “number of detainees” and shot dead six guards during a raid on a camp in Mahmudly village in west Raqqa, but civilians on the ground and the Kurdish authorities have denied the reports. The Independent was unable to independently verify the claim.

Mervan Qamishli, a senior Kurdish official said “there was no accurate information on the names or total numbers of fugitives” because of the fighting.

However least 800 affiliates of Isis broke free form Ain Issa displaced camp, around 100km north of Mahmudly, over the weekend, which Kurdish officials said was attacked by members of the group.

It is unclear what happened the rest of the 13,000 residents of the camp which is now empty or whether other fighters have managed to break free.

French officials have confirmed that nine French fighters managed to escape while Belgium’s security assessment agency said two of their nationals had also escaped custody.

The Daily Telegraph reported that two British Isis affiliates from east London, Tooba Gondal and Zara Iqbal, were among those who escaped but that they were intercepted by Turkish-backed Syrian troops as they tried to flee.

A medical coordinator for the Kurdish Red Crescent in Ain Issa said that in total at least 50 fighters were freed in the attacks.

“Almost all the guards were killed or wounded. The number of guards has been reduced in the past few days to help fight the Turkish army,” Monir told The Independent.

“People here are worried and most of them have left to Raqqa itself or other cities. There has been an unprecedented wave of displacement. I live in a ghost town now,” he added.

Iraq promised on Thursday to repatriate its nationals who are Isis fighters as well as their families in a bid to help the Kurdish authorities.

Al-Hakim said foreign fighters come from 72 countries and “their countries should take the needed measures.”