Erdogan Lends ISIS a Hand, Pushes Fleeing Human Shields Back Into Their Hands with Water Cannons

http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2015/06/13/erdogan-lends-isis-a-hand-pushes-fleeing-human-shields-back-into-their-hands-with-water-cannons/

Erdogan Lends ISIS a Hand, Pushes Fleeing Human Shields Back Into Their Hands with Water Cannons

by Bridget Johnson


After the Islamist AKP party cruised to defeat in last weekend’s parliamentary elections, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government announced the border would be closed to Syrians fleeing ISIS as “there is no longer a humanitarian tragedy,” in the words of Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmuş.
Kurtulmuş further claimed Wednesday that people were “fleeing strikes by coalition forces and the progress of Kurdish fighters in the region.”

He laid blame not on the Islamic State but on the anti-ISIS coalition for driving Syrian refugees into Turkey with “reasonless and meaningless” airstrikes.
More than 13,000 Syrian refugees fled across the Turkish border in the first week of June. But a chilling scene unfolded today as families trying to flee to safety faced two enemies with freedom visible on just the other side of the fence: Turkish troops firing water cannons at them, and ISIS forces right at the border, herding them back from the fence.
ISIS activists on Twitter claimed that the terrorists were there to distribute food and water to the refugees, which include Arabs and ethnic Turkmen, and save them from nearby Kurdish YPG forces.
The fear is that ISIS wants to keep the civilians there in Tal Abyad to use the Syrians as human shields as the YPG approaches. “Our people that have been forced to displacement during the ongoing operation against ISIS gangs can settle in Cizîrê Canton cities like Serêkaniyê and Hesekê, without being made to leave Syria and take shelter in other countries,” YPG General Command said in a statement. “The displaced people will be provided with every need of theirs. We will offer all kinds of support in order for our people to turn back home safe after the ending of the operation.”
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