Kurdish refugees from Syria languish in Iraq

While focus is on the uprising in Syria which started almost a year ago, Syrian Kurds revolted years before.

AMNESTY: Health Concerns for Detained Syrian Activist

Shibal Ibrahim, a member of Syria’s Kurdish minority and a political activist, has been held incommunicado by Syrian security forces since his arrest on 22 September 2011. He is believed to be in poor health, and is at risk of torture and other ill-treatment. He is a prisoner of conscience, detained solely for his activism. Read more

HRW: Syria report

Human Rights Watch WORLD REPORT 2012: Syria, a repressive police state ruled under an emergency law since 1963, did not prove immune in 2011 to the pro-democracy Arab Spring movements. Anti government protests erupted in the southern governorate of Daraa in mid-March and quickly spread to other parts of the country. Security forces responded brutally, killing at least 3,500 protesters and arbitrarily detaining thousands, including children under age 18, holding most of them incommunicado and subjecting many to torture. The security forces also launched large-scale military operations in restive towns nationwide.

Read more

The Rise of The Kurds – the moment I embraced the essence of my nation, I breathed

Like many Kurdish people in Syria, I lived between two worlds and was treated as a second-class citizen. My family was one of many families going through a transitional phase between Kurdish ethnicity and endeavors to melt us into another ethnicity. Both Syrian society and government pushed us to integrate with the majority in Syria, but without fully accepting us.

As a young girl I was in school I used to omit the last letter in my surname so I would not be exposed to mockery. It was hard for me to be Kurdish. Many Kurd-haters wanted to obliterate everything that makes me a Kurd. As I became a young woman, those who hated my people had nearly succeeded in getting me to turn me on my own people, and to brainwash me. I began to detach myself away to avoid being called a traitor by the majority of society. Read more

Syria’s Kurds mistrust government and opposition: activists

(Reuters) – Syrian Kurds, the country’s largest ethnic minority, do not trust President Bashar al-Assad, nor the opposition, so for now have largely kept out of the uprising against the government, exiled Kurdish opposition representatives said.

The Kurds are also wary of Turkey’s growing influence on the Arab groups trying to overthrow Assad, fearing that if they succeed, they will crush Kurdish hopes for autonomy in Syria, due to Ankara’s opposition to home-rule for its own Kurds. Read more

Sunday 8 January 2012

All the best for 2011

At this beginning to 2012, we hope that we can all find the strength to work together for the good of everyone, for humanity, and that positive changes come in 2012.

We hope our logo man in the barbed wire finds his freedom ..

Khalaf Dahowd and Sheila Mosley, Co-Chairs of SKS.

Text of the signed agreement between NCB and SNC 30 December 2011 – English version

Text of the signed agreement between the National Coordination Body for Democratic Change [NCB] and the Syrian National Council [SNC], to be submitted to the Secretariat of the Arab League as a joint political document for the Congress of the Syrian opposition that is expected to take place under the umbrella of the Arab League in January 2012.

Following talks lasting for more than a month involving the leadership of the NCB and the SNC, the parties agreed on the following: Read more

The Opposition is working together for the future of Syria

The National Coordination Body for Democratic Change in Syria [NCB] has announced a change in the political situation with news of the signing of an agreement between the NCB and the Syrian National Council [SNC] in the Egyptian capital late on Friday, 30 December 2011, following talks lasting for more than a month which involved a significant number of the leadership of both parties. The agreed text sets out the political and democratic rules for the transitional period, and determines the important parameters for Syria’s future which aspire to ensure that the homeland and every citizen’s rights are treated with dignity, and for the foundation of a civil democratic state.

Burhan Ghallioun has signed the agreement on behalf of the SNC, and Haytham  Manna signed on behalf of the NCB, and this agreement will be deposited as an official document with the Arab League in the presence of Secretary General Nabil el-Arabi on Sunday, 1 January 2012, at 3.30pm in Cairo time.

http://syrianncb.org

[Comment: SKS congratulates the NCB and the SNC for persevering, and finding a unified way forward. We wish them every success in working together and with others who will inherit a future in the new Syria.]

 

Friday 30 December 2011

Qamishli demonstration:  There are news reports coming in that two people have been injured by gunfire in Qamishli today:

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