Destroyed Aleppo industrial zone waiting for reconstruction

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Destroyed Aleppo industrial zone waiting for reconstruction

Before the crisis, Alleramoon Industrial Zone was specialized for traditional Syrian industries like fabrics. In October 2012, when Aleppo was dragged into the crisis, rebels occupied the whole industrial zone.

CCTV’s Xu Dezhi reports.

“We left on the 23rd of October 2012, expecting the unrest to finish and for us to be back within a few days. Those few days became four years, and after four years we entered the factory to see it destroyed and looted,” Fabric Factory Owner Kaldoun Soukar said.

Soukar’s factory no longer having a door, he simply covered the building with a steel board. There used to be 50 fabric machines inside the workshop, but now, nothing is left except rubble.

“They took the machines just to strip metals out of them, like brass, iron and aluminum. Machines that are easy to carry were taken along with products and thread, while everything left was damaged. Now my factory cannot operate again at all,” Soukar said.

Airstrikes and shelling might damage the exterior. But the stealing and sabotaging are not likely the direct result of fighting. Basel Nasri, the business partner of Soukar, suspects rebel fighters are behind it.

“It is clear that there is a systematic plan for destroying the industry of Aleppo. The whole area is now empty and we can see many machines on the border waiting to be transported to Turkey,” Nasri said.

All the workers were gone. Some fled Syria and some moved to other areas.

“My grandfather and my father created this factory. This is a family business. We grew little by little. It took only 4 years to destroy 80 years of work,” Soukar said.

Soukar’s fabric factory isn’t the only one affected. 600 factories and 250 shops inside the industrial zone have been destroyed. The total loss is about $10,000,000, and the damage leaves jobless about 100 workers per factory on average. Shrapnel from missiles and debris from damaged buildings, indicating the destructive consequence of the war.

Soukar and Nasri said the Chamber of Commerce in Aleppo has a plan to reconstruct Alleramoon Industrial Zone. But with no funding and no peace, no one knows when this plan can start.