UN Envoy: Turkey Uses Drinking Water as Weapon of War Against Civilians in Syria’s Hasaka

Syria’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations Bashar al-Jaafari said Turkey uses drinking war as a weapon of war against ordinary people in the country’s Northeastern province of Hasaka.

“The sufferings of people in the Jazira Region are neither limited to the criminal practices of Daesh (ISIL or ISIS) nor the crimes being committed by the illegal international coalition, which loots Syria’s resources. Their ordeal is escalated by the crimes of US and Turkish troops and those of their associated separatist militants and members of terrorist groups,” Jaafari said during a virtual UN Security Council session on the situation in Syria on Thursday, presstv reported.

The Syrian diplomat noted that more than one million civilians in Hasakh and surrounding neighborhoods are thirsty, suffering from the lack of drinking water for more than 20 days.

Jaafari added that Turkish forces and their allied terrorists have cut off water from the Allouk station, located near the border town of Ra’s al-Ayn, and feeding wells more than 16 times.

He went on to say that even though the US-led military coalition has recently admitted to the killing of at least 1,377 civilians since 2014, the matter will go unnoticed as long as Belgium and Germany are the so-called Syria humanitarian co-penholders at the Security Council.

The Syrian UN ambassador emphasized that the Damascus government and Syrian humanitarian organizations are carrying their responsibilities in the face of Turkey’s water supply cuts in Hasaka, but deployment of US and Turkish forces to the area is impeding the process.

Jaafari added that terrorists, in line with the policies of states hostile to Syria, blew up the Arab Gas Pipeline between the towns of Ad Dumayr and Adra a few days ago, causing a blackout across Syria.

“The terrorist attack carried out by US-sponsored terrorist groups in al-Tanf region is only a fraction of the economic terrorism that has been ongoing against Syria,” he said.

Syria’s official news agency SANA reported late on Thursday that water pumping resumed in Hasaka after “government efforts and international pressure” on Turkey.

On October 9, 2019, Turkish forces and Ankara-backed militants launched a cross-border invasion of Northeastern Syria in a declared attempt to push Kurdish militants affiliated with the so-called People’s Protection Units (YPG) away from border areas.

Ankara views the YPG, which is supported by the White House, as a terrorist organization tied to the homegrown Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has been seeking an autonomous Kurdish region in Turkey since 1984.

Two weeks after the invasion began, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan signed a memorandum of understanding that asserted the YPG had to withdraw from the Turkish-controlled “safe zone” in Northeastern Syria within 150 hours, after which Ankara and Moscow would run joint patrols around the area. The patrols have come under attacks by militants ever since.