A two days tribunal on Turkey’s alleged war crimes in north-east Syria took place in Brussels this week and resulted in a preliminary statement claiming that the Turkish state is committing war crimes and crimes against humanity.
The Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal on Rojava vs Turkey was organised by several lawyer organisations and the Democratic Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (DAANES). Representatives of the Turkish government were absent. According to the organisers, the Turkish government had been invited but refused to participate, resulting in a “trial in absentia”.
The tribunal was hosted by the Free University of Brussels (VUB) and had brought together human rights activists, legal experts and witnesses of Turkey’s military operations in the region. It said that it drew inspiration from the Russel Tribunal in 1967 on the Vietnam war and referred to the lack of a international mechanism to prosecute those accountable for war crimes in Syria.
Psychology Professor Gerrit Loots at VUB emphasised the importance of the tribunal. “With the support of the VUB, we stand for the protection of human rights and the defense of Rojava,“ he said, referring to the Kurdish autonomous region in north-east Syria. “Rojava is a place where women's liberation and democracy are being built, and we will defend it.”
The Permanent People’s Tribunal on Rojava vs Turkey, 6 – 7 February
Legal experts Ceren Uysal and Jan Fermon presented the Tribunal's case against Turkey, detailing what they claimed are systematic violations of international law.
According to the preliminary statement, issued on Thursday evening, the testimony “paints a consistent, compelling picture of widespread, pervasive and systematic punishment of a people. Their crimes? Being Kurdish, and creating a society built on principles of equality, justice and solidarity. The aim of the punishment is the eradication of the Kurdish identity, presence and culture.”
The focus of the evidence was mainly on the period from 2018, when Afrin in north Syria was occupied by Turkey, to late 2024.
The Kurds in Afrin were forced from their homes that were seized and offered to Sunni Arabs and Turkmen, often themselves internally displaced persons in Syria during the civil war. Street signs in Afrin were replaced with Turkish names and Turkish replaced Kurdish as a language of instruction. The total of displaced Kurdish people was put at 300,000 by the tribunal.
The tribunal heard also evidence of bombardments of villages in north-east Syria in October 2019, leading to forced displacements of nearly 140,000 more people, and saw evidence of the use of forbidden weapons.
Turkey's attacks on Syrian territory, without any United Nation Security Council authorisation, amount to an international crime of aggression, the tribunal concluded. It sees a pattern of bombings, forced displacements, and destruction of infrastructure and cultural heritage, to prevent the return of those forced out.
As previously reported, Turkey says that it is defending its legitimate security interests at the border with Syria and continues to see the Kurdish militia (YPG) that controls 20 - 25 % of north-east Syria as an extension of the outlawed and terrorist-designated Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) which operates inside Turkey.
“We recognise that Türkiye has legitimate security concerns in Syria,” said Kaja Kallas, EU’s High Representative, in her press remarks at a recent press conference (24 January) in Ankara with the Turkish foreign minister. She was cautious about the Kurdish issue and did not mention DAANES or EU’s position on YPG.
“Terrorism poses a grave threat to both the EU as well as Türkiye. We agree that ISIS must be kept down. Any actions in northern Syria must take the delicate balance of serious, hopeful and fragile future into account.”
The tribunal rejected Turkey’s justification for its military operations in north Syria. “The Democratic Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (DAANES), formed in 2014 out of the chaos of the Syrian civil war, is a model of direct democracy, justice, ethnic coexistence, gender equality and peace, founded on principles of pluralism and inclusivity.”
The EU is closely following the development in Syria after the fall of the Assad regime and is reaching out to the new leadership in Damascus. Ahmed al-Sharaa, the transitional president of Syria and leader of the rebel militia who overthrew the regime, might soon be invited to Brussels if the sanctions against him are lifted, according to an EU spokesperson on Thursday.
There are still Russian military bases in Syria. The new regime is eager to enforce its rule in all Syria and have all foreign troops, Turkish in the north and Israeli in the south, withdraw from the country. But the threat of a new Turkish invasion of Kurdish held territory in north-east Syria might upend the hopes for a peaceful and inclusive transition to a better future for Syria.
“We are concerned about the current situation in the north-east of Syria, and how this might impact stability,” Anouar El Anouni, spokesperson for Foreign Affairs and Security policy, told The Brussels Times. Asked on Thursday about the People’s Tribunal and whether the EU would take note of its decisions, he declined to comment.
The organisers of the People’s Tribunal are aware that its rulings are not legally binding but hope that they will contribute to documenting the truth, raising public awareness, and shaping any future legal processes.
M. Apelblat
The Brussels Times
