Two young Germans have joined the vigil resistance on the Kobanê-Suruç border for a week, while the vigil at the border enters its 37th day. The youth say the Kobanê resistance is one of the most important resistance struggles in the world and that they get to know Turkey through the soldier-police attack on the people holding the vigil, witnessing the resistance.

Jakob Weidder and Arne Büttner came to Turkey for a project they are carrying out in the Datça district of Muğla province, in the south west of Turkey, and after the resistance of YPG/YPJ forces in Kobanê was covered in the international media, they went to the border line in order to witness and join the resistance there. Having contacted the coordination in the town of Suruç, they went to Miseynter and Mehser villages and recorded the incidents at the border in order to make a visual project out of it in the coming period.

While the two have easily established friendly relations with the protestors at the border, their names have been changed into Sipan for Jakob and Xelat Şerwan for Arne by the people holding the vigil at the request of the two young people.

The two say they have witnessed how the Turkish state targets and attacks its own citizens.

The two German youth are students of film making at university and came to Turkey for a project they are preparing for their studies. They worked for a couple of weeks in the Datça district of Muğla for their project where they heard about the resistance of the YPG/YPJ fighters that attracted the attention of the world media. Then they left their project in Datça and went to the border in order to witness the resistance in situ.

The two came to the border to go to Kobanê, however could not cross the border as the attacks  intensified. Then they joined the vigil at the border and recorded the incidents there with their cameras as well as bringing together the aim of the resistance and the thoughts of the protestors through the interviews they made.

The two left Suruç yesterday. They briefly shared their experience at the border before their departure. Weider (Sipan) said they came to Suruç to record the historic resistance of the YPG/YPJ and they saw that the resistance in Kobanê and the resistance at the border became a unified struggle. Sipan drew attention to the fact that while it is ISIS attacking the people in Kobanê, it the Turkish state attacking the people at the border and said they have always read about the soldier-police violence in Turkey but now they have witnessed it themselves they have become better informed about it.  

Büttner (Xelat Şerwan) said the resistance in Kobanê that has continued for over a month is one of the most historic heroic resistance struggles in the world, adding that they witnessed it at the border even though they couldn’t get to Kobanê. Şerwan also said that they have been impressed by the determination of the people at the border not to leave the borderline despite the attacks of the soldiers, as well as the spirit and life of the people involved in the resistance.