“Baytna Syria” responds to the article published in the Turkish newspaper «Yeni Shafq»

Dear Editor-in-chief,

In response to your article “Avrupa terror ihraç ediyor” published on your website on Saturday 8 July 2017, Baytna Syria denies all claims in it and refutes every detail concerning it, and would like to clarify the following:

– Baytna Syria is a non-governmental, not for profit organization working for a free, democratic, inclusive and unified Syria where its sovereignty and territorial integrity are respected and where all Syrians are equal citizens regardless of gender, race, religion, sect, ethnicity, political affiliation or any other form of discrimination.

– Baytna Syria strives to empower the nascent civil society movement inside Syria through grants and capacity building and upholds the utmost standards of the International Humanitarian Law and the International Human Rights Law.

– Baytna Syria is completely independent from any military or political actor inside or outside Syria. Furthermore, it encourages civil society actors to completely disengage from these actors and to take their destiny in hand to maintain social cohesion in Syria and to create a civilian state where all citizens are equal.

– Baytna Syria works to hold all violators of human rights, including ISIS. the Assad regime, PYD and Jabhat Al Nusra, to account and believes in a national process of transitional justice and accountability.

– Baytna Syria respects and abides by the international law including anti-terrorism and anti-money laundering laws and therefore maintains a state of the art due diligence process to ensure compliance.

– Baytna Syria is glad to operate from Turkey, a country that has been very generous with the Syrian people and is still hosting more than 3 million Syrian refugees

– As per the law, we require you to publish this statement in the exact same place as where the article above-mentioned was published.

Best Regards,

Assaad Al Achi
Executive Director, Baytna Syria
11 July 2017