PKK/YPG terror group abducts 17 children in 2 days in Syria

Terror group kidnapped 6 children Wednesday in Hasaka province, others abducted Thursday, sources tell Anadolu

The PKK/YPG terror group has forcibly recruited 17 children in the last two days in the regions they occupy in the Syrian provinces of Hasakah and Aleppo, sources told Anadolu.

The terror group, which has increased the number of “checkpoints” on main roads and especially in front of schools, has accelerated child abductions in the two provinces, according to the sources.

It kidnapped six children Wednesday in Hasakah city center after high school final exams, and Thursday seven children from Qamishli District and four children from Aleppo’s Manbij district were abducted.

1,696 children in Syria recruited

Nearly 1,700 children were recruited and used by the PKK — a designated terror organization by the US, Türkiye and the EU, and its offshoots — the SDF and YPG — in 2022 in Syria, according to a UN report.

The annual UN report on children in armed conflict covers January to December 2022.

It said 32 children as young as 11 were also recruited and used in Iraq.

“I am gravely concerned by the recruitment and use of children by HPG/PKK. I urge them to end the recruitment and use of children and to release all children from its ranks,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in the report.

As many as 1,696 children in Syria were recruited and used mostly by “SDF/YPG/PKK” and other armed groups and non-state actors.

The PKK terror group’s Syrian branch, the SDF, recruited and used 637 children while 633 children were recruited by YPG/YPJ and four others by other components of the SDF.

In its more than 35-year terror campaign against Türkiye, the PKK has been responsible for the deaths of more than 40,000 people, including women, children and infants. The YPG is its Syrian branch.