07 March 2018•Update: 07 March 2018
By Baris Gundogan
ANKARA
Turkey has found evidence of the YPG/PKK terror group using children among its ranks following the discovery of memory cards of cameras that were seized during the ongoing Operation Olive Branch in Syria's Afrin region.
Turkey launched Operation Olive Branch on Jan. 20 to wipe out terrorists from Afrin in northwestern Syria.
The YPG/PKK terrorist group has been increasingly calling children to arms since the Turkish Armed Forces along with the Free Syrian Army launched the Afrin operation.
Documents seized from the region prove once again the dirty side of the terrorist group, an issue which has been highlighted by the Human Rights Watch on several occasions.
The memory cards prove the terrorist group was training children to fight against Turkish Armed Forces.
The photos on the cards revealed that children -- aged 13-17 years -- were holding arms and training with their weapons; they also show the poor standards of their lives in the mountains.
Instead of receiving a proper education, the children can be seen holding guns and aiming at targets.
They were also found posing next to the photographs of the terror group's jailed leader Abdullah Ocalan, as well as other so-called leaders.
In its report published on Feb. 12, Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, Virginia Gamba said tens of thousands of children were thought to be involved with armed groups in conflicts in Syria, Iraq, Mali, Nigeria, Yemen, Central African Republic, Libya, and elsewhere.
The report also touched on the children's involvement with non-state armed groups in these conflicts and their involvement with a terrorist group in Syria.
