On Saturday, September 6, 2025, the Committee of Displaced People from Serêkaniyê/Ras al-Ayn issued a statement warning of attempts by the Turkish state and its agencies, in coordination with illegal civilian and military councils, to purchase the properties and lands of Kurdish citizens forcibly displaced from the city of Serêkaniyê/Ras al-Ayn and its countryside.
The committee stated in its statement: “We are following with great concern and with increased national and legal responsibility the systematic attempts by the Turkish state and its various agencies to purchase the properties and lands of Kurdish citizens forcibly displaced from their city and its countryside.” It considered these practices “a systematic policy of demographic change, in flagrant violation of international humanitarian law, the peremptory norms of the Geneva Conventions, and relevant Security Council resolutions prohibiting the seizure of land or the alteration of demographic composition by force or through unlawful means of coercion.”
The committee added, “These policies constitute a clear violation of individual and collective property rights guaranteed in all international human rights instruments, foremost among them the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.” It emphasized that “any sale or purchase undertaken under conditions of occupation and forced displacement is legally null and void, and does not entail any rights or obligations.” It noted that “any party contributing to these practices is directly complicit in the crime of demographic change, which is classified as a war crime and a crime against humanity.”
The committee issued several demands and warnings, warning of “the danger of these policies that target the civilization and history of indigenous peoples (Kurds, Syriacs, Assyrians, and Armenians) and the right of our people to return to their homes.” It called on the city’s displaced residents to “hold on to their lands and not be drawn into any attempts at pressure or financial inducement to sell their properties and lands.”
It also called on the authorities in Damascus to “commit to implementing the terms of the March 10 agreement, including the provision for the return of displaced persons and refugees to their cities and villages, and to halt these hostile practices and policies in the occupied areas.” It called on “the notables and sheikhs of the Arab and Kurdish tribes of Serekaniye/Ras al-Ain to reject these malicious practices and policies,” stressing that “adherence to land and identity is the only way to thwart these suspicious plans.”
The committee called on international human rights and humanitarian organizations to “assume their legal and moral responsibilities, hold the Turkish state accountable for these practices, and work diligently to halt them immediately.”
The committee concluded its statement by emphasizing that “the rights of our displaced people to return to their homes and lands are inalienable rights that do not expire with the passage of time,” emphasizing that “all attempts to manipulate the reality of the region will fail in the face of the will of its people and their adherence to their land and identity.”
لجنة مهجري سري كانيه (رأس العين) تحذر من سياسات التغيير الديمغرافي من قبل تركيا في المدينة المحتلة
