from Paris, the Kurds are organizing to support their people

More than 28,000 dead. These are the figures of the last provisional assessment of the earthquakes established by the Turkish and Syrian authorities, an assessment which could “double” according to the UN. The World Health Organization puts forward another figure: 26 million people may have been affected by these deadly earthquakes. It is to come to the aid of the survivors that aid is organized from France. The Kurdish community is particularly mobilized.

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In Paris, the Pazem association is mobilizing for the town of Pazarcik, one of the towns at the epicenter of the earthquake. The collection takes place in the back room of the restaurant of the father of Derya, born in Pazarcik. She lists the products she was able to gather: “Milk, soap, bottles, diapers, sanitary napkins, medicine… We really go to the essentials.”

Jean-Charles drove an hour to participate in the collection of products. “I mainly brought things for children: powdered milk, soaps, hygiene products and baby stuff”, he explains. A harvest all the more necessary since since the disaster, humanitarian aid has struggled to reach the Kurdish town. “Today, on the spot, the Kurds are helped very little. There are many donations that are seized”denounces Derya.

“The goal is to help our people, all the people who are really in distress, who are really abandoned.”

Derya, Kurd from Paris

at franceinfo

“The more time passes, the less hope we have”

Standing at the back of the room, Aliyah, her father, observes the bags that accumulate. His ex-wife and part of her family are still in Pazarcik. “I have my brother there, we call each other every day. I have my nieces, and a half-sister whose body we did not manage to see. The more time passes, the less we have hope”he confides.

The Pazem association’s trucks will leave at the beginning of next week, heading for Iraq. The objective is to cross the border by the south, to have more chances to succeed in reaching the city.