IBT reports: Residents have returned to Cizre to find their homes destroyed by shelling. Authorities partially lifted a 24-hour curfew that had been imposed to facilitate security operations against Kurdish militants. A first wave of arrivals reached the town at the break of dawn, their vehicles loaded with personal belongings and, in many cases, children. In the battle-scarred Sur neighbourhood, homes have enormous holes blasted into their walls, ceilings have collapsed, windows are shattered and doors are hanging on their hinges.

The level of damage in some neighbourhoods evoked the early days of military conflict in neighbouring Syria with buildings gutted by shelling and shrapnel. “Those who did this are not humans,” said Cizre resident Serif Ozem. “What took place here is a second Kobani in a country that is supposed to be a democracy.” Kobani is a predominantly Kurdish town in northern Syria that suffered a brutal siege at the hands of the Islamic State (Isis) group. [Continue reading…]