The Rukban camp, sandwiched between Jordan, Syria borders and Iraq, Feb. 14, 2017. Raad Adayleh | AP
TASS reports (source):
The Syrian city of Palmyra, which is being rebuilt after its liberation from the terrorists, greets the first refugees from the Rukban camp, located near Syria’s border with Jordan.
The camp residents have told journalists that inside the camp, controlled by US forces and the militants, they have been charged money for tents, food and medicine, and they were even recruited into militant ranks. While al-Nusra Front terrorists retain control of Syria’s northern Idlib province, US forces occupy At Tanf region in southern Syria, where the Rukban camp is situated.
The returned refugees shed light on what life in the camp is like.
Money charged for everything
“This tent has cost us 50,000 Syrian pounds ($100). It was brought from Lebanon as humanitarian aid and sold to us,” says Ahmad Mohammed, one of the camp residents. “But that was only half the trouble: when we bought the tent, we discovered that there is nothing in the camp: no food, no water, no medicines.”
According to Mohammad, the militants charged money for everything. “Medical aid depended on the militants, too: if you cooperate, you have access to doctors, if you don’t, there will be no aid. Our relatives’ child got sick, a 4-year old girl. She had an infection, but nobody helped her. They ran out of money, and the child died right on my hands,” he recalls.
The militants would sell even humanitarian aid, received from international organizations, to refugees.
“Sometimes, we received aid from the Red Crescent, but we only saw a small portion of it, most often sold to us, not given for free. The militants take the free aid and resell it to the refugees —that’s their business. To get money, we had to work at the camp. They set up a brick factory, and we had to work like dogs there,” Ahmad recalls.
All the money went into the pockets of the militants, who, according to the refugees, ran the camp.
“Yes, there is some kind of administration, but it is just the same militants. There is no difference,” says Alya Mohammed, Ahmad’s brother. “They are all armed, they walk the camp with rifles, they have semi-military equipment, and they own the place.”
Besides, the militants conduct active recruitment among the refugees. “They distributed leaflets, calling to take weapons and go fight against the [Assad’s] regime, even called for this during the prayers,” Alya says. “Any man could turn to the administration to enlist. It was a simple way not to die of hunger.”
The Mohammed family managed to save enough money to pay ransom to the Rukban administration: this was the only way of leaving the camp and returning to Palmyra.
The camp
The Rukban camp appeared at the Syrian-Jordanian border in 2014, after Amman closed its border over security concerns. The surrounding region is being controlled by the militants, which creates a tough humanitarian situation in the camp. The camp lies within the 55-km zone, controlled by the US forces, stationed at At Tanf military base.
Joint efforts of Moscow and Damascus helped find a way out of a deadlock and evacuate more than 19,000 refugees from the camp. However, regional UN bodies delay evacuation of the remaining refugees under various pretexts. In February 2020, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that the US uses the existence of the camp as a pretext to justify its illegal military presence in Syria.
Crimes against humanity, CENTCOM. Those Rukban Death Camp refugees are not simply going to forget about it in a few years. Let’s see if you man up to your crimes and own them in front of a judge at the Hague.
Wishful thinking, i’m afraid… I don’t think any G.I.’s will see the inside a courtroom, especially the one at The Hague. Exceptions could be snitches, remorseful ones threatening to go to the press. Otherwise not going to happen…
The closure of Ruckban must continue to be a priority of the Assad government and Russian diplomats. Their plight to be brought before the United Nations Security Council with these freed refugees giving testimony to the criminal acts being done there. More exposure! More press!
I watched the UNSC meeting a year ago on the camp. One side blamed the other for the problems that were brought to light by either the Red Cross or some UN committee, I think more likely. responsible for the camp. Each member of the SC made a statement in which the final bit was ” we hope that all parties involved can solve their problems and assist the committee helping these refugees “. Not verbatim but pretty much which every single member of the SC said. No saying time for country X to stop the bullshit . Not even close. An unbelievable torrent of platitudinous diplomatic horseshit so no one was upset. I thought what an absolute waste of time with the final result NOTHING happened. The UNSC was an impotent toothless condescending waste of time.
No refugees, no funds or personnel for terrorist ranks and no reason for any US bases.
No Syrian in their right mind would want to help these murderers and thieves if they can help it. However, they could do a great service by identifying the vermin and providing intelligence.
The fake caliphate is done, long live Syria.
Let us not leave out one other State character, Jordan, who has profited and still does upon the refugees plight. It cost over 60 U$D er ton, twice normal rates, to unload relief goods in Jordan, who then lease the land and storage facilities to UN and other world charities. Jordanian trucking firms then haul the goods to camps, where the labeling sheets show that somewhere between Jordan and US owned distribution and warehousing 1/3 to 1/2 of stated loads got lost. US military andNATO do not even check goods and just automatically sign recieving papers. US through not its military but by a system of cronieism by State and Department of Defence pay contractors very high fees nand do so with little oversight to end graft. Jordan is under NATO, contract and paid to the tune of 10s’ of billions yearlly by US and several NATO militaries as staging and practice grounds. Let us not forget the initial cost to purchase goods from UN member nations, their charges to fly, truck, cost paid by US and NATO , and weeping nelleys of charity groupies donations, at over 3x normal market values. In some. cases, Balkans and Haitti UN placed a tarrif upon all goods coming into and going out of the areas of their peace mission. It is a worldwide system of graft and racateering, and for those who are supposed to get aid, the article spells it out. UN relief agency relieves US from supplying goods and taking care of miseries to millions of innocents they caused.
The complete Western systems of governance in all its forms have been corrupted for the advantage of Zionists.
It it even possible to drain this swamp without calamitous events that will reshape the world ?
UN comes off from this with bad optics again, as the primary body that ‘patches up’ with international money and material contributions the misery US wars cause. US war > UN patch up – rinse and repeat.