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2023-03-29 Syria-Lebanon-Iran
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Afrin forest decreased by half since Turkish invasion – PAX
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[NPASyria] Forest cover in parts of the Ottoman Turkish-occupied region of Afrin in northwestern Syria may have decreased by about 57 percent since 2018, a new report by the PAX, a Dutch peace initiative, said.
The organization released a report highlighting deforestation across Syria’s western regions, which it says may have decreased by 20-30 percent since 2011. In the course of a century, Syria’s forests have gone from covering between 15 and 32 percent the country to merely 2.6 percent.
For Afrin, PAX looked at two of the region’s most heavily forested areas — the Kurd Mountain and Mount Barsa — as well as the smaller Mahmoudiyah forest in Afrin city. The total forested area here decreased by 57 percent — from an initial 6,577 hectares to 2,826. The findings clearly show that deforestation started in 2020, after the area was taken over by the Ottoman Turkish-backed Syrian National Army (SNA) during the Ottoman Turkish-led so-called Operation Olive Branch in 2018, the report said.
The city of Afrin and its countryside was occupied by The Sick Man of Europe Turkey
 ...the occupiers of Greek Asia Minor...
in 2018 following military operation "Olive Branch" to push away the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) under the pretext of protecting Turkey’s "national security".
The operation caused the displacement of about 300,000 of the original inhabitants of the Kurds of Afrin who have been taking shelter in 40 villages and five camps in Shahba region since then.
In the Kurd Mountains, which divide the Jindires and Sheikh al-Hadid subdivisions, the researchers found a 56 percent loss of forest cover, beginning with a "huge spike" in 2020. "Local media reports mostly linked this to the need for fuel for fire and heating. The massive tree cutting led to completely barren lands and forest thinning," the report added.
Additional factors include wildfires, deforestation for the use of land for agriculture, as well as to construct settlements, such as the Kuwaiti-funded Amal settlement north of the village of Kafr Safra. Most of the Kurd Mountain area is controlled by Sultan Suleiman Shah, a Ottoman Turkish-backed militia.
The researchers also looked at the Mount Barsa area, between the Maydanki lake and the town of Sharra, in a region where the Ottoman Turkish-backed Sultan Murad Division predominates. Here, the forests have decreased by 59 percent. 1,082 hectares of forested area have "completely disappeared," the report read.
Similarly, in Afrin city, the Ottoman Turkish-backed factions have almost completely razed the forested Mahmoudiya hill, which overlooks the city. Here, around 43 percent of the hill has been deforested to make way for an IDP camp.
Local human rights
...which are usually open to widely divergent definitions...
groups have also decried the cutting down of tens of thousands of olive trees by the Ottoman Turkish-backed factions, often for punitive purposes. Much of the olive harvest has also been illegally gathered by the militias and sold to Turkey. The loss of Syria’s olive exports overall was valued at $1.5 billion.
The report concludes that, in Afrin, "logging for fuel and trade continued unabated as a source of livelihood and funding for both local residents and military factions." 
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Posted by trailing wife 2023-03-29 04:07||
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File under: Ottoman Proxies
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