Controversial project of the Welthungerhilfe

The Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) has joined the protests of dozens of human rights organizations and media companies against a project of the German humanitarian organization "Welthungerhilfe". According to a tender of its branch office in the Turkish city of Gaziantep, the Welthungerhilfe is planning to renovate 400 houses in the Syrian-Kurdish region of Afrin. The houses, which belonged to displaced Kurdish families, are now inhabited by Islamist militiamen and their families. Together with the Turkish army, they had displaced the original population and appropriated their homes. "The initiative to renovate these houses would perpetuate the occupation and support Erdogan's plans to Turkishize and Islamize the population of Afrin," criticized Lina Stotz, STP expert on ethnic and religious minorities. "The fact that the militiamen and their families were encouraged to take the homes of the displaced Kurdish, Christian, and Yazidi people is to be seen as an attempt to change the demography of the region – a clear violation of international law. Therefore, we are calling upon the Welthungerhilfe to stop the project immediately. The Turkish occupation of Northern Syria should not be financially rewarded or supported in other ways. Instead, the organization should concentrate on the distribution of relief goods."

The northern Syrian province of Afrin has been occupied by Turkey in violation of international law since March 2018, and the occupying forces have repeatedly and systematically intimidated the Kurdish, Christian, and Yazidi population. Large parts of the population were displaced. The STP has repeatedly criticized Erdogan's resettlement plans in the region. On November 5, the STP, along with 24 other organizations, addressed the Welthungerhilfe with an appeal to refrain from renovating Kurdish houses in Afrin for the militiamen. Among the signatories are the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and numerous Kurdish organizations.

International humanitarian law prohibits resettlement initiatives with the aim of changing the demographic structure of an occupied territory. Any efforts to resettle Turkish or Syrian militiamen or their families to Afrin must therefore be condemned.