The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and the New People’s Army (NPA) pay its Red Salute to Sosin Mihemed (Sosin Bîrhat), commander of the Women’s Protection Units (YPJ), and three other fighters who were martyred in a drone attack launched by the Turkish Armed Forces on the Til Temir Military Council communications center in Rojava on August 19.

The Party extends its deepest sympathies to the Kurdish people over their loss of Comrade Bîrhat who selflessly offered her life and all her capabilities to the cause of her people’s struggle to build their own democratic country.

The statement includes the following:

“We have learned how Comrade Bîrhat played a crucial role in the revolutionary war of defense in Rojava and armed offensives against occupying Islamic State and Turkish forces in Northern and Eastern Syria. As commander of the YPJ, she was also at the forefront of the struggle against misogyny and for women’s rights by organizing women’s self-defense units and promoting the engagement and leadership of women in the field of leadership, politics and military. Indeed, the YPJ is renowned for its revolutionary women fighters.

She is well-loved by her compatriots and comrades for her courage and dedication to advancing the revolutionary resistance against the Turkish state’s campaign of ethnic cleansing of the Kurdish people in Northern and Eastern Syria.

A day after Comrade Bîrhat’s death, revolutionary woman fighter of the NPA Kerima Lorena Tariman (Ka Ella), 42, was captured and killed by the fascist armed forces of the Duterte regime in Silay City, Negros Occidental. Like comrade Bîrhat, Ka Ella offered her life for the liberation of the Filipino people from fascism, oppression and exploitation. She was a mother, a journalist and poet who sacrificed everything she had to serve the people’s national democratic cause.

Together with the oppressed people across the world, we mourn the death of Comrade Bîrhat and Ka Ella. Let us vow to avenge their deaths by dealing heavy blows against the fascist oppressors.

Şehîd namirin! The fallen are immortal! They will forever be treasured by the people whom they have served and be an inspiration to the international proletariat and oppressed peoples in steeling their commitment to the revolutionary cause.

Let the martyrdom of Comrade Sosin and Ka Ella inspire women across the world to take up arms and make use of their weapons to break all political, cultural and social barriers and serve the cause of the oppressed and exploited masses for national and social liberation.”