Turkey Braces Itself for Another Wave of Syrian Refugees

The Syrian armed forces have started to move against more towns in the north of the country, sending panicked refugees, including children, rushing across the frontier to safe havens in Turkey. By Thomas Seibert

"Syrian refugees attend a funeral of an anti-regime protester on the Syria-Turkey border, near the Turkish village of Guvecci, in Hatay, Turkey 11 June 2011. The number of Syrians who took refuge in Turkey from a violent crackdown of anti-government protests in Syria has reached approximately 10,000. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said Turkey was concerned over incidents in Syria as the Assad government escalates violence against civilians in a crackdown of anti-government protes

On the Syrian side of the border, makeshift tents of blue, white and green plastic sheeting gleam in the sun. "Everyone is living in the tents over there. There's no one left in the villages," says Abdullah, a Syrian who has made it across into Turkey. From the Turkish border village of Güvecci several improvised tent cities can be seen on the Syrian side. As many as ten thousand people are said to be holding out in them.

If these people start to head for the border, the number of refugees in the Turkish reception centres will double at a stroke. And it could happen any day now. Turkey may be facing a fresh wave of refugees from Syria.

Abdullah, who doesn't want to give his real name for fear of reprisals from the Syrian security forces, is one of the luckier ones. He is able to stay with relatives on the Turkish side. For the people in the tents along the border, however, conditions are deteriorating. They have no water, no food, no medicine. "Two of their children have already died," says a farmer's wife in Güvecci. From her house on a hill she looks down on around 500 people in tents in the valley below.

Generous Turks

21-year-old Mohammed is one of the Syrians living in the tent cities. He and a number of other young men walk across the border illegally almost every day to fetch bread and water in Güvecci. The Turkish soldiers guarding the border fence let them pass. "We have money, but the Turks give us everything for free," says Mohammed.

In Güvecci village square there are several small trucks loaded with water and tent sheeting for the Syrians in the camps. The aid has been donated by local people from the area around Güvecci; many here have relatives on the other side of the border. The Islamic aid organisation IHH, which was criticized for its involvement with the Gaza aid flotilla last year, has sent around five tons of aid to the border at Güvecci to be distributed among the Syrians in the tents.

These initiatives are independent of the Turkish state's aid programme for the refugees. Around 15 million euros have been earmarked for this, and the government says they will soon be deployed in sending relief supplies to the Syrian camps.

Why are the Syrians staying on in the tents in such difficult conditions, when they could be living in well-organized refugee camps in Turkey? "Many of them are farmers. They go back to their villages during the day to check up on their livestock, and at night they sleep in the tents," says Abdullah. The Syrians are afraid of President Bashar al-Assad's security forces. They feel safer here, close to the border fence, where they can see the Turkish soldiers. Up until now, Syrian troops have not shown their faces here.

Sounds of battle getting closer

The Syrian tent dwellers can thus feel secure without having to abandon their homes and possessions and flee to Turkey. Soon, however, that may change. The Syrian armed forces have started to move against more towns in the north of the country. In the village of B'dama, just two kilometres away from the Turkish border, the army is said to have gone in with tanks and armoured cars to search for members of the protest movement. According to the opposition, thousands of Syrians are on the run and the army is now trying to stop those who flee.

Nonetheless, many Syrians may still try to escape the violence and flee to Turkey. At night, say those on the Turkish side, the sounds of battle can be heard on the wind, and the sounds are getting closer.

Up till now around 10,500 Syrians have sought safety in Turkey. Three quarters of the refugees on the Turkish side are women and children, housed in three refugee camps. Two more camps are currently being built. On Friday the American actress Angelina Jolie visited the camps in her role as a prominent UN ambassador for human rights, and was reassured to find them equipped with everything people needed.

Families are being housed together. People are given three meals a day. There are washing machines. The Turks have even thought to provide drawing classes and singing groups for the children, as well as sewing courses for the women. The authorities clearly expect the guests from Syria to stay for some time: according to press reports, condoms are being distributed to the refugees so that they can avoid unwanted pregnancies.

Until now there has been space for everyone in the Turkish camps. But if the Syrians in the tents along the border decide to flee to Turkey, and if more come to the border from the interior, that will change. The Turkish foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu is already speaking of the possibility of a "regional and international crisis" if there is another big wave of refugees.

Deserters refusing to fire on civilians

This cannot be ruled out. Syrians in Güvecci tell of atrocities committed by the army. "Their tanks fired on the houses," says Mohammed, referring to the recent major offensive by the Syrian security forces on the town of Jisr al-Shughour, just 20 kilometres from Güvecci. His own cousin, he says, was killed in the violence. Abdullah speaks of incidents of torture and deserters who refused to fire on civilians. The Assad regime is behaving in its own country "like Israel in Palestine", he says, contemptuously.

Maher Assad, the brother of the Syrian president, is especially feared. He leads a special unit of the Syrian armed forces. "He knows no pity," says Abdullah. He describes how Maher's unit goes from town to town crushing the rebellion against the regime. "Syria will only settle down once the Assad clan is gone," says Mohammed.

Rebuff of an old friend

Their descriptions of acts of brutality by the army cannot be verified, but they tally with other reports coming out of Syria – and also, evidently, with the findings of the Turkish government. It, and its secret service, have been following the uprising in the neighbouring country very closely.

A few days ago, Assad called the Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to demand that Turkey send the Syrian refugees back over the border, but found himself stonewalled. The press reported Erdogan's response to the Syrian president as: "We are not sending anyone back while people's lives there are in danger."

Nonetheless, Hasan Türkmani, a Syrian special envoy to Ankara, appeared optimistic that the refugees will soon come home. The Syrians were only in Turkey "temporarily", he said, adding that some had already returned.

There's little evidence of this in Güvecci. Syrians like Abdullah report that, after an earlier internal displacement, some of their countrymen believed the promises given by the authorities and did return home. "And then," he says, "they were tortured."

Thomas Seibert

Translated by Charlotte Collins

Editor: Lewis Gropp