(8 Apr 2019) LEADIN: Locals are leaving their homes in the northern Kurdish region of Iraq because of the shelling of their villages.
The villages of upper and lower Sharanesh were particularly affected in late March.
STORYLINE:
It looks like an idyllic mountainside village.
But, look closer and the deserted, damaged houses surrounded by debris tells a different story.
The residents of Sharanesh village are leaving their homes because of continued shelling.
Barozh Mahmoud Abdulkarim owns a house in lower Sharanesh village, home to Muslim families.
On 23 March his house was hit by an artillery shell.
He was inside, but luckily he survived and has since moved out to the nearby town of Zakho.
As he enters his house he steps over his damaged belongings and debris left over from the recent attack, which he attributes to Turkey.
"Turkey claims there was a PKK base there," he says.
"But they targeted my house, and there was no PKK base in my house."
Abdulkarim says the shelling happened at five o' clock morning.
"I don't know how and why they did that to us," he says.
Upper Sharanesh village has about twenty houses and its population is mainly Christian.
On 29 March one of the artillery shells hit the house of a Christian family.
Like Abdulkarim, Hani Thoma Gariya has also moved his family out of his village.
"We were sitting and having dinner when we heard the sound of Turkish artillery," says Gariya.
"The first rocket fell behind the house, so we stood up and took shelter in a safe place," he says.
"And all of sudden, the second rocket hit," he continues, "then again, all of sudden, the third rocket hit here, in the living room as you can see, and this is what happened."
Azad Hanna Yalda is also in the process of moving out of the village.
"We cannot take it anymore honestly," he says, "there is a shelling every two or three days."
"The day it happened, I was sitting alone in my house and they started bombing from about quarter to four until half past six," he says.
Zerevan Muhsin, the director of Darkari district in northern Kurdish region of Iraq, says properties were damaged by the shelling on the 23 and 29 March, but luckily no residents were injured.
"Thankfully, they are all safe," he says.
The Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, has waged a more than three-decade old insurgency in Turkey's mostly Kurdish southeast region.
The group is considered a terror organisation by Turkey and its Western allies.
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