«Death camp» at US base in Syria (PHOTO)
In recent days Syrian opposition have been showing photos and videos pointing at dire situation with refugees in Er-Rukban camp which is 25 km from American military base in At-Tanf area where Syrian, Jordanian and Iraqi borders meet.
There have been recurring reports that people live hard life in Rukban. First refuees appeared there back in 2014. They sought to go to Jordan, but they were not allowed there under the pretext that the country was already overloaded with the Syrians who had fled the war. The territory of the Rukban camp is not under the control of anyone except the militants. It is divided into sectors between various armed groups, among which one can easily find ISIS* supporters.
Prior to the beginning of July 2016, residents of the "Er-Rukban" could regularly visit Jordan. The militants based in the camp used this to make profit from smuggling, because, as, thanks to American support, they gained control over the routes through the Syrian desert, which they formally had to protect from ISIS.
The defense turned out to be well.. nothing special. Probably because the line between At-Tanf militants and ISIS thugs is very thin sometimes.
On 6 July 2016, ISIS suicide bombers attacked the posts of the Jordanian border guards and police, the came from the side of At-Tanf. Perhaps ISIS militants simply fulfilled the order of some dissatisfied smugglers. But the Jordanian government made the right conclusions and fully closed the border in this area The order was closed for every inhabitant of Er-Rukban.
Refugees’ situation and militants’ well-being subsequently deteriorated. For a while, Syrian desert routes of smuggling from ISIS-controlled territories allowed the opposition groups to "make ends meet".
However, necessity to liberate Euphrates bank from terrorists and make Damascus vicinities safe from ISIS gangs made Syrian army, with the support of Russian aviation, to establish control over the Syrian desert.
The militants of the opposition, who in the least did not aspire, in spite of all Pentagon’s statements, to fight ISIS on the Euphrates, tried to resist governmental forces. After all, it was important for them not to lose contact with their relatives from East Homs areas, East Kalamun and Southern Syria. The ade their profits on smuggling with these regions, while receiving American salary as well.
But, having suffered defeat in the clash with the Syrian army, the groupings of the "Lions of Orient", "Kuvat Shahid Ahmad Abdu", "Shahid Brigade of Karyainain" and other groups were forced to retreat to At-Tanf, where the Americans created 55-km security zone fore them under cover of its aviation.
However, since this summer Trump’s administration officially stopped financing almost all the South Syrian opposition groups. After that situation in Er-Rukban camp has become close to catastrophic.
Meanwhile, after ISIS defeat on the Euphrates, the Syrian troops and the Russian military aviation system quite predictably intensified security measures on the perimeter of the so called 55-km zone, through which the groups of militants raided territories loyal to the Syrian authorities. The most notorious case was the attack of ISIS mobile units which came to the city of El-Karyanein in the eastern part of Homs province at the end of September 2017, which resulted in mass executions of the local population.
Some humanitarian organizations including those related to the UN started to show concern about state of affairs in Rukbahn some time ago. However, one international humanitarian convoy came to Rukban ver the year. To compare with: only in October and November this year thirty-eight UN humanitarian columns came from Jordan to the territories controlled by opposition groups in Deraa province to the south of Syria.
As for Rukban, the talks about helping the local residents remains mere words. First of all, because international organizations simply can not send humanitarian aid here for reasons of their own security. The territory of the camp is controlled by the groups which do not obey anyone. Even Pentagon’s representatives recognized this recently.
At the same time, they tried to shift the blame to the Syrian government, which allegedly does not ensure the passage of humanitarian columns to the borders of the 55-km zone in At-Tanf. Then the Americans are allegedly ready to accompany the humanitarian aid to the camp. It is not clear, however, how they can do this, if, in their own words, they have not enough forces to control the situation in Er-Rukban with 500 servicemen dislocated at At-Tanf.
Thanks to Russia’s initiative to assist in the deployment of humanitarian convoys, the Syrian authorities stated that they were ready to ensure the delivery of assistance to compatriots in Rukban - but on condition of fair distribution of the cargo. It is clear that the militants in the camp do not like it. They are more interested in appropriating all the supplies to themselves (although the question arises of how different factions will divide them among themselves).
Friends or business partners of militants from among Syrian opposition are trying to pressurize Jordanian authorities and the UN top by launching recent media campaign telling about the troubles of Rukban people in social networks. It looks especially ridiculously in Twitter, for example, the accout of notorious "Omar Madania", who sometimes does not mind publishing photos of the Syrian soldiers’ heads chopped off by the militants.
But in any case, Jordan is not going to open its border immediately and the UN is not going to send convoy basically in the hands of ISIS. Humanitarian aid arrival to At-Tanf area is possible to be organized from Syria’s side, as Russia offers it. But then the Syrian government and international humanitarian structures need to verify the passage of the convoy to the destination by themselves to deliver aid to either 35 or 55 thousand people in Er-Rukban (number of refugees are taken from publications of the Syrian opposition and various human rights organizations).
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* terror organizaion banned in Russian Federation
