War of a Forgotten Nation
Syria, Kobanî / Ayn al Arab, January, 2015. The eagle of the Liberty square. Fighting and bombing destroyed much of the city. In four months, the fighting killed more than 1600 people, including more than 1000 jihadists. Supported by air strikes from the coalition, Kurdish forces managed to regain control of the Syrian town of Ayn al-Arab. © Emilien Urbano/MYOP
War of a Forgotten Nation
On the front of Serekaniye / Ras al Ayn, northeastern Syria, March 2015. A YPG fighter at the rear base and observation point on the front line against the Islamic state organization, which is two kilometers away. Most of the fighting happens at night. © Emilien Urbano/MYOP
War of a Forgotten Nation
Cizre, a Turkish border town with Syria, July 2015. Thousands of Kurds joined a demonstration following the death of Assan Nasre, who was linked to the PKK youth wing YDG-H. YDG-H is the Patriotic Revolutionary Youth Movement, the militant youth wing of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). This 17 year old was presumably killed by the police during the night of July 29/30, 2015. © Emilien Urbano/MYOP
War of a Forgotten Nation
Al Hassakah, Syria, August 2015. A monument bearing the effigy of Hafez al-Assad, father of Bashar al Assad. Hassakah is the commercial and political center of the governorate of the same name. Sparsely populated before the French colonial rule in the early 20th century, the city is now divided in two parts: one ruled by the Syrian Government and the other by the PYD Syrian equivalent of the Turkish PKK. © Emilien Urbano/MYOP
War of a Forgotten Nation
Syria, Derbasiyah, Al-Hassakah Province, February 2015. A Bashir Kurdish commande. He fights against ISIS. Here he is in his military base waiting orders calling him to combat. © Emilien Urbano/MYOP
War of a Forgotten Nation
Suruç a border town with Syria, Turkey, November 2014. In the green Mosque, Kurdish refugees arrived from Kobane, in the Turkish town of Suruc, near the borders of Syria and Turkey. They were fleeing the offensive of ISIS jihadists. In four months, the fighting killed more than 1600 people. © Emilien Urbano/MYOP
War of a Forgotten Nation
Syria, Al Hassakah province, August 2014. Yazdi refugees try to make calls and take cover from the dust winds. Iraqi Yazidi refugees at Newroz camp in Al-Hassakah province, north eastern Syria, being cared for by Kurdish Syrian parti PYD and their fighter of YPG/YPJ, creating a “humanitarian corridor” for an evacuation of the Yazidis between Syria an Iraq Mount Sinjar, on the territory and the frontline held by extremist sunni militant of Islamic State. the International Rescue Committee, after fleeing Islamic State militants. Nearly 1,000 Iraqi families fleeing advances by the jihadist Islamic State group have taken refuge in the Syrian province of Hassakeh. They arrived in Syria despite the raging civil war there that has ravaged the country since March 2011 and killed more than 170,000 people. The number of Iraqi civilians arriving in camps on both sides of the Syrian border after being besieged for days by jihadist fighters has declined sharply, a UN spokesman said. © Emilien Urbano/MYOP
War of a Forgotten Nation
Sinjar, Iraq, August 2014. Two dead bodies of Yazidi persons kill By ISIS jihadist, in the “humanitarian corridor” created by Kurdish YPG fighter armed branch of the Syrian Kurdish parti PYD through the territory and the frontline held by extremist sunni militant of Islamic State , to evacuate Yazidi people from the Mount Sinjar where they are trapped and surrounded by ISIS Jihadist. Nearly 1,000 Iraqi families fleeing advances by the jihadist Islamic State group have taken refuge in the Syrian province of Hassakah. They arrived in Syria despite the raging civil war there that has ravaged the country since March 2011 and killed more than 170,000 people. The number of Iraqi civilians arriving in camps on both sides of the Syrian border after being besieged for days by jihadist fighters has declined sharply, a UN spokesman said. © Emilien Urbano/MYOP
War of a Forgotten Nation
Syria, Al Hassakah province, August 2015. Kurdish PKK-YPG fighters in a base south of Tall Abyad, on the frontline towards the stronghold of the Islamic State capital Raqqa. Tall Abyad, 50 km from Raqqa, a key city conquered by Syrian Kurdish forces YPG in June 16th, 2015, was a very important and strategic transit point between Syria and Turkey, for jihadist of the Islamic State. © Emilien Urbano/MYOP
War of a Forgotten Nation
First image: Al-Malikiyah, Syria, March 2015. A 17-years-old Syrian (centre) and a Turkish fighter (right), both accused of being members of the Islamic State Organisation, were captured on the Tal Hamis Syrian front by YPG militias- the Syrian equivalent of the Turkish Kurdistan Workers’ Party, the PKK. They are confined in a prison formerly used by the Syrian Regime's Security Services.
Following the offensive of the jihadist Islamic State organisation and the siege of Iraq's second largest city, Mosul, on the 10th of June 2014, as well as self-proclaimed Caliph, Abu Baker Al Baghdadi's declaration of the Caliphate, which spreads across Syria and Iraq and is ruled by a rigorous and extremist vision of the Islamic law, Kurdish fighters from Iraq, Syria and Turkey have risen against them.
In seized territory all over Iraq and Syria, as is the case with Sinjar in the Iraqi Ninivah province, ISIS have captured, enslaved and committed mass murders against minorities like Yazidis, Kurds, or Shia Muslims.
Since then, Kurdish fighters from the Turkish outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), and Peshmergas (i.e. the ones who face death) in Iraq, have become the main force fighting the jihadists in northern Syria and northern Iraq, winning successive, important battles and acquiring territories, subsequently making the self-declared Jihadist Caliphate weaker by the day.
Nestled between Empires and surrounded by conquerors, Kurdish people inhabiting the Kurdistan regions in Turkey, Iraq, Syria, as well as Iran, have been envisioning the creation of an Independent State for a hundred years, and for the first time, today, they feel closer to realising their dream.
The pictures of this on-going documentary project are being taken in Iraq, Syria, and Turkey, as of August 2014.
Emilien Urbano.
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