Turkish-backed group’s disruption of water puts 460,000 people at risk, UNICEF warns

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – A United Nations representative in Syria on Monday said interruption to a key water station in the country’s northeast puts at least 460,000 people at risk as efforts ramp up to prevent the spread of the coronavirus disease.

On Saturday, Turkish-backed armed groups cut the flow from a reservoir that supplies water to areas in northeastern Syria’s Hasakah province that the Kurdish-led local authorities control.

According to a public UNICEF statement, the move was the latest in a series of disruptions in water pumping over the past weeks.

The Alouk Water Station is located near the border town of Serekaniye, which Turkey and its militant proxies took control of in October 2019 during Turkey’s so-called Peace Spring Operation.

Under Russian mediation, northeastern Syria has been providing electricity to the Turkish-occupied areas in exchange for water flow.

However, Turkish-backed groups have regularly cut off the water flow to demand Kurdish-led authorities in northeast Syria provide more electricity.

The UNICEF statement did not mention Turkey or the Turkish-backed groups by name.

Nevertheless, UNICEF Representative in Syria Fran Equiza said the interruption “during the current efforts to curb the spread of the coronavirus disease puts children and families at unacceptable risk.”

Water from the Allouk water station has been interrupted again putting 460k people at risk in northeast #Syria. Interruption of water supply during the current efforts to curb the spread of the Coronavirus disease puts children at unacceptable risk.https://t.co/lIVEOVrDpJ

— Fran Equiza (@franequiza) March 23, 2020

“Handwashing with soap is critical in the fight against COVID-19 (coronavirus).”

He underlined that the station is the main source of water for around 460,000 people in Hasakah city, Tal Tamer, and the al-Hol and Areesha camps.

“Uninterrupted, reliable access to safe water is essential to ensure children and families in the area don’t have to resort to unsafe water sources.”

The local administration has said it would distribute water to residents through tankers and would also dig wells for home use.

UNICEF and its partners are now also supporting families in the city of Hasakah and camps for displaced families with water trucking.

“But this barely covers minimum needs if the water supply is interrupted again,” Equiza warned in the statement.

“Water and water facilities must not be used for military or political gains—when they do, children are the first and most to suffer.”

The Kurdish-led authorities have taken precautionary measures to prevent the spread of the coronavirus pandemic to their region such as closing the Semalka border crossing a few weeks ago, closing public places such as cafes and restaurants, and imposing a curfew this week.

The Syrian government reported its first coronavirus case on Sunday. Meanwhile, no cases have been reported in areas under the Kurdish-led Autonomous Administration of North and East of Syria (AANES).

However, the local administration has insufficient capabilities to carry out tests and is dependent on Damascus to test patients where facilities exist.

Therefore, it is possible that coronavirus has already spread in the northeast, going undetected.

According to a website linked to the Washington-based office of the Syrian Democratic Council (SDC), the political branch of the administration, the Kurdish-led authorities have relied on stop-gap solutions like repurposed malaria tests and temperature checks. These tests only give an inaccurate picture of the patient’s condition.

While the World Health Organization (WHO) has provided testing facilities in Idlib, dominated by the al-Qaida offshoot Hayat Tahrir-al-Sham, it has not done the same in the northeast.

Thomas McClure, a Syria-based researcher at the Rojava Information Center, told Kurdistan 24 that the local health authorities are “currently modeling a 10 percent death rate in the camps and detention centers due to the pre-existing spread of tuberculosis and other diseases there.”

These camps are inhabited by not only thousands of refugees but also thousands of local and foreign families with alleged ties to the so-called Islamic State.

As a result, thousands of vulnerable civilians in the northeast are at extremely high risk of the coronavirus also due to the lack of water supplies.

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany