Syrian woman widowed by PKK struggles for survival

By Omer Yasin Ergin

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey

A Syrian mother has been left to take care of her four children on her own after losing her husband in a PKK terrorist attack in southeastern Turkey last week.

Abdurrahman Hassan was among the 11 people, including two police officers, who were martyred on Nov. 4 when a bomb targeted a police building in the central district of Baglar in Diyarbakir province.

On the morning of the attack, Hassan left home for work at a dry cleaner after having breakfast as usual, his wife, Nawruz Zulfo told Anadolu Agency.

"Soon after, I heard a blast and went outside. I looked everywhere to find my husband. Somebody told me that he was dead. Then I went to the morgue.

"His face was all burned; his arm was chopped off. I could only identify him from his clothes," she said, adding Hassan's body was sent to Syria, where they had been living until three years ago when their house was hit in a bomb attack in the northern Hasakah province.

Zulfo burst into tears as she asked for help from the Turkish authorities so that she can look after her four children: Muhammad, 10, Lilav, 9, Lava, 6, and Ahmet, 2 -- the youngest born in Turkey.

The attack conducted during the morning rush hour left 100 others wounded and destroyed the nearby buildings. The governor’s office said the PKK claimed responsibility for the attack.

Syria has been locked in a vicious civil war since early 2011, when the Bashar Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests -- which erupted as part of the "Arab Spring" uprisings -- with unexpected ferocity.

Since then, hundreds of thousands of people are believed to have been killed and millions more displaced.

Turkey is home to some three million Syrian refugees, who are living both in camps as well as in towns and cities across the country, mainly in the southeast.