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Antonia Kilian s CPH:DOX Screener The Other Side of the River Explores Female Emancipation in Syria s Rojava Region
Ed Meza, provided by
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As a feminist filmmaker, Antonia Kilian was inspired to travel to northern Syria after forces of the Kurdish autonomous region known as Rojava liberated the city of Minbij from ISIS militants.
It was in Minbij that Kilian met Hala, a young Arab woman who had fled her conservative family and the prospects of a forced marriage and found safety and emancipation at a Rojavan military academy, where she trained to become a soldier in the Women’s Protection Units (YPJ) part of the Syrian Democratic Forces controlled by the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD).
April 30, 2021
Clashes broke out April 20 in neighborhoods of Qamishli, between the Asayish internal security forces affiliated with the Kurdish-led Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria and the National Defense Forces, which includes fighters loyal to the Syrian government and is receiving support from Iranian militias. The fighting began after Khaled al-Hajji, an Asayish security official, was killed in an attack by members of the National Defense Forces at a military checkpoint near al-Wahda roundabout, close to the Tayy neighborhood, in southern Qamishli. The Asayish responded and targeted several National Defense Forces checkpoints in the same neighborhood, and managed to kill three members and arrest others.
Estonian Defense Forces (EDF) military intelligence center has focused on security policy and military developments in Russia in its yearbook, which published Tuesday.
The EDF finds a deepening trend whereby Russia s attitude in international relations has become increasingly revisionist, emphasizing the concept of a multi-polar world, BNS reports.
This is an attempt to revise the existing, functioning system which is accepted by the international community, via foreign policy (and, if necessary, military) efforts. Unforeseen factors, such as the COVID-19 pandemic have only temporarily limited this, the yearbook says.
Constitutional amendments established the legal bases of the duration of the state s regime. This has dispersed domestic political risks concerning the key issue of the state, namely how to resolve the continuation of Vladimir Putin s presidency and/or regime.
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THE KURDS are sometimes called the world’s largest nation without its own independent state. Some 30m or them are scattered mostly across Iraq, Iran, Syria and Turkey. They share a culture and language, and most are Sunni Muslim. But since the end of the first world war, all four countries have tried to suppress the Kurds’ culture and restricted the use of the Kurdish language. At times they have resorted to horrifying violence, such as when Saddam Hussein, Iraq’s then dictator, used nerve gas against them in 1988. Thirty years ago, in response to Saddam’s attempt to crush another uprising, America, Britain and other countries imposed a no-fly zone over Iraqi Kurdistan and airlifted humanitarian aid to the region. The supplies exceeded the Allies’ deliveries to West Berlin after the second world war. Many Kurds saw the protected enclave as the embryo of a Kurdish state. More recently the Kurds have been at the forefront of the successful fight against the jihadist
SDF continues to recruit child soldiers, despite pledges to stop the practice
September 15, 2020
Fighters from the Kurdish women s protection units (YPJ) attend the funeral of an Arab fighter of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in the town of Tal Tamr, 21/12/18 (AFP)
AMMAN Musa’b (a pseudonym) had always been concerned about the environment his sixteen-year-old son Fawaz was growing up in. His modest income as a crane operator left the family struggling, and he was worried that his son was looking to the People’s Protection Units (YPG), the armed wing of the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), who patrolled Deir e-Zor as role models, impressed by their status and salary.