One killed in northeast Syria pro-government protest

BEIRUT — Kurdish security forces opened fire on pro-government protesters in northeast Syria on Sunday, killing one person and wounding several others, a monitor and state media said, as tensions rise between the sides.

Kurdish forces control a large part of the northeast of the war-torn country, but regime forces are also present there including in the main regional cities of Hasakeh and Qamishli.

Damascus and the Kurds have mostly coexisted during nearly a decade of conflict, but tensions have risen in recent weeks with both sides accusing the other of restricting goods movements to areas under their control.

State news agency SANA published images of dozens of men in civilian clothing protesting in Hasakeh on Sunday against an alleged "siege" by Kurdish forces of a government-held part of the city.

Kurdish security forces shot at the crowd, "killing one civilian and wounding four others", SANA said.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on sources inside Syria for its information, put the toll of wounded at three.

"The Asayesh Kurdish police force opened fire, killing one person and wounding three people among the protesters," observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman said, adding the person killed was a regime policeman.

An Asayesh spokesman declined to respond to an AFP request for comment.

SANA has accused the Kurds of preventing fuel and flour deliveries into Hasakeh, and of surrounding a neighbourhood in Qamishli.

Syria’s Kurdish minority built up their own semi-autonomous authorities in the northeast of the country during the civil war, although some state institutions remain.

The Kurds have been a key partner in the US-backed military campaign against the Daesh terror group.

But when Turkey launched a cross-border operation against them in late 2019, the Kurds were forced to seek help from Damascus and the latter’s ally Russia to stem the attack, leading to regime and Russian forces deploying in the area.

Car bombs killed 11 people including six civilians in two separate incidents in Turkish-held northern Syria on Sunday the monitoring group said.

The first attack near a cultural centre in the town of Azaz killed six civilians including a young girl, the observatory said.

An AFP reporter at the scene saw a mangled car ablaze, black smoke billowing into the sky.

A man rushed away from the site of the blast, carrying what appeared to be a child wrapped in a bloodied cloth.

In the second incident, a car bomb targeted a checkpoint of pro-Ankara rebels near the town of Al Bab, killing five fighters, the observatory added.

Areas of northern Syria held by Turkish forces and their Syrian proxies are regularly rocked by such bombings.

There is usually no claim for them, although Turkey routinely blames Kurdish fighters it accuses of being “terrorists” linked to its outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party.

On Saturday, explosives planted in another vehicle took the lives of eight civilians including four children in the city of Afrin, which Turkish forces and their proxies seized from Kurdish forces in 2018.

Syria’s war has killed more than 387,000 people and displaced millions since starting in 2011.

Northern neighbour Turkey has seized control of several regions inside Syria in military campaigns against Daesh and Kurdish fighters since 2016.