Turkey- PYD using terror fight to commit rights abuses: Amnesty

9/10/2015 4:01:53 AM

(MENAFN- The Journal Of Turkish Weekly) Rights watchdog Amnesty International has said that the terrorist PKK’s Syrian affiliate the Democratic Union Party (PYD) was using its fight against the Daesh militant group as a pretext for committing rights violations in northern Syria.

According to a report issued this week the PYD-led autonomous administration in northern Syria is carrying out arbitrary detentions without trial orcharge and denying detainees’ basic right to defend themselves.

"The PYD-led autonomous administration cannot use its fight against terrorism as an excuse to violate the rights of individuals in areas under its control"Lama Fakih senior crisis advisor at Amnesty International is quoted as saying in the report.

Last month the rights group interviewed several detainees at two prisons in Qamishli and Malikiya in Syria’s northeastern Hasakah province.

Detainees who included several Arabs said they had been held without charge or trial for almost one year. Others said they had been tried after having been subject to lengthy pre-trial detention periods while also complaining of unfair trial proceedings.

"It is clear that many detainees have faced grossly unjust trials in a serious violation of their rights"said Fakih. "Everyone should have the right to defend themselves before fair courts."

Fakih added: "Instead of trampling all over people’s rights in the name of security and counterterrorism the PYD-led administration should ensure that the rights of detainees are respected."

ThePYDis a Syria-basedaffiliate ofthe PKK whichisconsidered a terrorist organization by Turkey the U.S. and the EU.

Both Turkey and the U.S. have reportedly warned the PYDagainst pursuing any demographic changes in the region urging the group to allow the return of Turkmens and Arabs who fled their homes earlier amid fighting between Kurdish peshmerga forces and Daesh.

In June thePYD --with the help of U.S.-led coalition airstrikes --regained full control of the city of Tal Abyad near the Turkish border after having lost it earlier to Daesh.

Since then thousands of local Turkmen have reportedly had to flee their homes in Tal Abyad after having been threatened by thePYDand thePYD’s military wing the Syrian-Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG).

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