All language subtitles for BBC.This.World.2019.Anna.The.Woman.Who.Went.to.Fight.ISIS.720p.HDTV.x264.AAC.MVGroup.org_track3_[eng]

I never thought that I could be
someone who could participate

in the revolution here.

This is really important and amazing
and I'm going to learn a lot,

and I don't regret it for a second.

In 2017, a young British
woman went to Syria.

She was going to fight
the Islamic State group.

I don't have any military
background, so I have no conception

of what it is actually going
to be like if we do end
up facing them.

She joined the YPJ, an
all-female Kurdish militia,

an important ally for the West
in the war against terror.

A year later...

..she was killed.

On behalf of all in this house,
our thoughts are very much

with Miss Campbell's family at
this incredibly difficult time,

and a very inspirational
young woman.

Although she died a hero for many,
her death left unanswered questions

for her family.

She knew that her life
was endangered and...

..I want to know that my daughter
did not die for nothing.

Everybody's trying to figure
out how could a person

from her background, her upbringing,
her family, make that decision.

Now her father is trying to make
sense of his daughter's decision.

I want to experience what
it was like for Anna.

How was the world seen
through her eyes?

The more I know about
her, about her story,

the more I would feel close to her.

GUNSHOT

I feel a lot of guilt.

A lot of grief.

I obviously feel her loss
all the time, every day.

I'm never going to see my
daughter again.

I was looking forward to a future
in which she would be a mature,

more rounded, more experienced
woman, who would have lived

through all the fire of
youthful idealism

and come out the other side.

Hi.

How's it going?

DIRK SIGHS

How about you? Yeah, I'm fine.

Everyone's going to feel
guilt around death...

QUIET CHATTER

..and obviously, the
situation, in this case,

is going to make people feel guilty
because they're always going to be

like, "Oh, well, I could
have prevented this."

QUIET CHATTER

We're all dealing with
it in our own ways.

We've got each other and
we're such a strong family.

It's pretty special, what we've got.

Yeah.

QUIET CHATTER

How are you, Dad?

Not feeling fantastically
effusive. No, I'm not either.

I'm really trying hard to respect
the decisions that she made.

To just say, "I'm proud of your
choices and I'm proud of you."

I'm not there.

Yeah.

It's taking it out of you.

I feel robbed. I feel like...

..this could have been intercepted.
This could have been avoided.

LAUGHTER

It's a bit too noisy for me.

I'm going to go into the garden.

I want to know what her
world was like.

It's what I think about a lot.

I simply didn't know enough
about what was going on for her.

Grandad! There's three
frogs in the pond!

Wow. Show me.

It began when she went to Sheffield,
when she went to university.

She fell in with a group of quite
radical left-wing thinkers.

I know that before she
went to Sheffield,

she hadn't developed a
core direction.

After Sheffield, it began
to emerge quite unmistakably.

She said she felt embarrassed
telling people that she was an
English student.

There were bad things
happening in the world

and she wanted to be part of
a change, or a solution.

After a year at university, Anna
left and dedicated herself

to activist causes.

Anna decided to define herself
by making some bold choices.

She believed in direct action
and became increasingly involved

in the antifascist movement
and hunt saboteuring.

She decided to be on
the fringe of society

and question everything
about society.

She thought that fascism was at
the root of the success

of capitalism, which kept
people poor, disempowered,

and was basically immoral.

That was her belief.

We used to have
arguments about this.

I respected her need to impact
directly on the world...

..but I never thought that that was
the right way of going about things.

She would say to me, "Dad
doesn't really understand.

"He thinks you just write
a letter to your MP

"and something will be sorted, and
he doesn't realise that people

"can't affect their difficult
lives like that."

Anna, can I ask you a question?

Why do you never do up
your pyjama jacket?

ANNA GIGGLES

Because I can't be bothered.

Oh, this is going to be a squash.

When she was at school, she defended
a bumblebee in the playground.

Some kids were tormenting
it, kicking it around,

and she furiously came to the
defence of this little insect

against this group, who would have
all been turning their torment

onto her.

She just steadfastly refused
to be affected by that,

and she staunchly protected
this little insect.

And that was, I think...her soul's
calling was to protect something

and nurture it until the
last possible moment.

It makes me think of her mum.

I was just thinking about her mum.

Mum was definitely an
activist in her own way.

She was like, "So, guys. I'm
staging this demo in Lewes.

"Do you want to come?" I was
like, "OK, Mum. What is it?"

She was like, "We're all going to
sit in the doorway of Boots

"because they've got their whole
offshore tax thing going on,

"and we're just going to sit there

"and we're just going to drink tea
and we're not going to move.

"We're staging a sit-in."

And then the next thing I
know, she's been arrested.

I think she was on the front page of
the Sussex Express or something,

being handcuffed, and the headline
was like, "OAP Gets Arrested,"

which she found hilarious. She was
like, "I'm bloody 50 years old."

Anna had Adrienne's bravery
and Adrienne's idealism,

and Adrienne's example.

She went on demonstrations
with her mother.

So, she regarded her
mother as her model.

Adrienne was diagnosed with
breast cancer in 2008.

She was only 48.

She had all the treatment, the
chemotherapy, the radiotherapy.

It appeared that there was no
cancer in the lymph gland,

so we thought everything
was all right.

But then in 2012,

she found that she couldn't
read because the letters

all danced around on the page.

Anna's mother discovered the
cancer had spread to her brain

and could not be treated.

She spent her last months at home.

My body is failing. My kidneys
have virtually given up.

My blood pressure's very high,

and, you know, I can feel
my body closing down.

It is one of the most painful
things I've ever had to go

through in my life.

Sorry. I'll just have a moment.

SHE SNIFFS

In November 2012,

Adrienne died, leaving behind Dirk
and their four children.

Anna kept her feelings to herself.
She was a private person.

She probably felt that she had
to take on her mother's role

as a kind of pioneer activist,

which she might not have
done to the same extent

if her mother hadn't died.

Two days after Adrienne had died,

she said, "Dad, come to
the Anarchist Bookfair,"

and there was a meeting
going on about Rojava.

I didn't actually know a lot
about the ins and outs

of the situation in the Middle East.

In 2012, as civil war swept through
Syria, the Kurds in Rojava

in the north-east of the country
took control of their territories

for the first time in 100 years.

After generations of oppression,
they seized the opportunity

to establish an autonomous region...

..a radical new society based
on the principles

of cooperation and feminism.

The Kurds say they will not
be silenced again.

They're calling for autonomy
in a democratic Syria.

But by 2013,

they were under threat from IS,
known in the region as Daesh.

"in northern Syria decided to roll
out this inclusive socio-political

"experiment, which is going really
well, but they're under attack

"from Daesh and they
really need our help."

She never engaged me
in that conversation

and I really wish she had
because I would have loved

to have been that close
to her and that involved

in her decisions.

Like Anna, hundreds of people
from around the world travelled

to Syria to fight for the Kurds

and almost fifty have died
in the past four years.

But for Anna, it was the Kurds'
belief in creating a different type

of society that inspired her.

She wanted to join what became
known as the Rojava revolution.

Hi, Jamie. Hi, how are you doing?

Good to see you. Yeah.

Welcome to the Kurdish Community
Centre in Harringay. Thank you, yes.

I haven't been here for a few
months, but I came last summer

and then I did see all
the pictures on the walls.

It was a bit like, "Too soon.

"I can't see all these
faces again so soon."

Because it's taken so much
out of you, I imagine.

Yeah.

Coffee?

JAMIE SPEAKS KURDISH

My Kurdish is so terrible now.

In 2018,

Jamie Janson returned from
fighting in Syria with the YPG.

He was detained for taking
part in foreign fighting

and is still under investigation.

How did you first get interested
in the Rojava situation?

What drew you to it?

I'd been doing a lot of
activist work in the UK.

I didn't feel like we
made any progress.

We dangle a few banners off
buildings and nothing really changes

and I'd kind of kept Rojava
in the back of my mind

for a long time, but I'd
always put off going there,

partly because I didn't want to pick
up a gun and try to hurt people.

I was always a non-violent
direct activist and just came

to the conclusion that I needed
to step across that line and join

a real revolution to try
and make a better place.

That's a big decision.

You joined the militia of Rojava.
It's called the YPG, right?

Yes. They knew they had to defend
themselves by force.

The YPG is the People's Protection
Units, that was set up for the men,

Did you get involved
in any fighting?

Yes, there was...

We were sent to Raqqa for
the last five weeks

of the fight against Isis.

It felt very strange to be
holding a gun and thinking,

"I could actually have to kill
someone with this at any moment."

I was hesitating, thinking,

"I'm actually going to fire at human
beings. Am I going to do it?"

And then I did it.

It's hard to even talk to you about
it because I really feel like people

suffer more at home not
knowing what's going on.

That's one of the things
I feel worst about,

that I had to lie to my family,
to betray their trust.

They thought I was visiting a
girl in Serbia and then I rang

up from the academy and said,

"Sorry, Mum. It's going to
upset you, but I'm in Syria."

She was trying not to cry.

She was very much like,
"I'm coming to get you."

I'm like, "Mum, I'm
sorry. You just can't.

"For the first time in my
life, you can't do anything

"for me right now. This is
my decision and it's...

"..it's shitty for you, but this is
what I want to do as a man."

My conscious choice with my
children was to encourage them

and accept them in whatever
they chose to be or to do...

..because I can remember with my own
parents, particularly my mother,

that her expectations of me were
quite difficult to match up to.

I think she thought that she was
doing me a service by giving me

the message that, basically,
I wasn't good enough.

She always placed goals in front
of me that I had to achieve.

I grew up thinking
that I would never...

..I would never amount to anything.

My mother would say to
me things like,

"When you performed, I was so
embarrassed I felt sick."

That went right in.

So I didn't want to do
that to my children

because I carry all my own baggage
from the parenting that I had.

I always encouraged them in
the way that they were...

..their characters were emerging
and just allow them to feel safe

in the family.

Anna? Hm? What are you doing?

Are you?

Her mother was worried
about her being bookish.

I said, "It's fine.

"If she wants to go and
read books all day,

"what's the problem? That's
who she wants to be,

"but if you tell her she
shouldn't be doing it,

"then that's going to
cause her a problem."

That's how we brought them up.

We trusted them and I trusted
Anna. I've always trusted her.

This is Mrs Rabbit.

This is Mrs Duck.

She's obviously a duck.

How many are there? That's all. 30.
Wow.

This is Mrs Fox, and the reason
why she's holding a flag

is they're going to
have a Barbie war.

They're always having wars against
the Barbies. Even the women fight?

Sadly, the women and children
do usually fight. Really?

In May 2017,

Anna had an announcement to make.

She just said to me, "Dad, you
know, I'm going to Rojava."

I didn't question her about it
because I knew from experience

that if I did, unless it was wholly
supportive, it would be seen

as an attempt by me to
undermine her decisions.

I said, "I accept what you have
decided, but you may be killed."

And she said, "Dad, there's nothing
I can do to reassure you,

"and I understand that you're
worried and alarmed,

"but this is more important
to me than that."

All I could say was, "Well,
it's been nice knowing you."

Because there was no conversation.

Mentally, I had to let go of her.

Seven months after Anna's death,

Dirk has decided to make
the trip to Rojava.

I want to experience
what it was like for Anna.

I would have preferred to have
participated in her life more.

I'd love to have an insight
into her reality.

How was the world seen
through her eyes?

The more I know about her, the
more I would feel close to her.

Dirk is following in Anna's
footsteps, flying to Iraq

and travelling across land
to the Tigris River

that borders Syria.

It's amazing to be travelling

through this extraordinary
landscape.

Anna had to cross the
Tigris secretly

and she had to cross at night.

By joining a foreign militia, Anna
ran the risk of being prosecuted

as a terrorist upon her
return to the UK.

The journey was dangerous.

She crossed the border in a small
boat with other internationals.

International volunteers usually
bring far too much stuff,

particularly American volunteers,

who all turn up with
all sorts of stuff

that they try and
get through customs.

Telescopic sights
and thermal scopes,

and body armour and whatnot.

The European ones find it harder
to get a hold of military kit,

so we just turn up with
unnecessary camping gear.

Whereas the Kurdish fighters

are running around with a piece of
naan and a grenade.

You know, very fast
guerrilla fighters.

When Anna arrived in Rojava, she
was placed in a YPJ commune

to learn Kurdish and
begin her training.

Whilst there, she was filmed
by a documentary maker.

This is the first time this footage
has been seen.

I suppose...

Yeah, maybe I'll say a bit
about why I decided to come here.

I never thought that I could be
someone who could participate

in the revolution here.

I want to know that it's real.

As anarchists, we're always told,

"Oh, you're just idealists,
you know, you're naive.

"That could never happen.

"That could never work."

Yeah, I feel like this is...

..this is really important
and amazing,

and I'm going to learn a lot.

And I don't regret it for a second.

Around 36 million Kurds
live in the Middle East

across Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran.

They share a language, but have
never had their own state.

Syria's two-and-a-half million
Kurds faced brutal oppression

under the Assad regime.

Even their language was banned
and their leaders imprisoned.

I'm trying to learn as much
as I can,

find out what life
is like for the locals,

just get a sense
of this whole place,

the dynamics going on here.

The lives of the Kurds in Syria
today have been transformed.

But in 2014, they faced a monumental
battle for survival,

when IS threatened a city
in the heart of Rojava.

NEWSREADER: The Syrian border town
of Kobane has become engulfed

in the fiercest fighting yet
between Kurdish forces

and the so-called
Islamic State jihadists

who are trying to seize it.

The fighting raged all day.

Plenty of explosions as the IS
guns target the centre of Kobane.

The fighting focused on Kobane
near the border with Turkey.

During a three-month siege,

the population of 45,000 fled,

leaving the YPG and YPJ
to face IS.

They're very trusting, the owners
of these vehicles.

It's like the whole thing
could come falling down on top

of them any time.

This devastation is horrendous.

We haven't seen anything
like this in our country

since the Second World War.

REPORTER: The fight for Kobane is
far from over.

Officially, Turkey was an ally
of America in the fight against IS,

but now the Kurds accuse the Turks
of helping the jihadists.

REPORTER: As the fighting continues,
Turkey looks on.

They claim that Turkey wanted
to destroy Rojava,

something that Turkey denied.

REPORTER: These Turkish tanks have
been in position

for about a week now.

Kurds are infuriated
that while Kobane suffers,

they've remained still.

We don't need their weapons.

We don't need their support.

They just stop supporting Isis.

Turkey has had a long-running
internal conflict

with its own Kurdish population.

Many of the 14 million Kurds
in Turkey support the idea

of a Kurdish state.

But their efforts towards
independence

have been brutally repressed by
the government.

REPORTER: A potent sign of looming
defeat.

A large Islamic State flag
flying, where, yesterday,

there was only fighting.

The city's defenders, filmed
here by their own cameras,

say they relish the challenge
of taking on the militants

in their own streets.

But in recent days, the fighting
has seemed more and more desperate.

The video put out by the attackers
shows IS fighters advancing

to a hill overlooking Kobane.

After three months, the British
and the Americans

declared their support for the Kurds

and air strikes began to turn
the tide against IS.

REPORTER: Air strikes,
not the first,

but by far the most concentrated.

Again and again, throughout the day,

coalition warplanes hit
jihadi targets.

IS was defeated in Kobane,

but the city was reduced
to rubble by the air strikes.

And 1,000 Kurdish fighters
lost their lives in the battle.

When you see the reality
of this huge area of graves,

it's like the First World War.

You know, there are so many people,
you can't take it in.

Some of them that I've seen
were as young as 16, even 15.

The Kobane fight was hugely
significant

because it showed to the world,
and to the Turks,

that it couldn't be defeated that
easily.

These people are so hospitable.

So friendly.

They don't need a reason
to offer you a sweet

when they pass you in the graveyard.

They're very open-hearted.

That's how we brought our kids up,

to be connected, to be generous.

So she would have been among
her own kind here,

no doubt about that.

We've lost one person.

They're losing family members
all the time.

It's not just us which are
experiencing this loss.

You know, we can't even imagine
what they're experiencing.

They're losing everything they
have, you know?

We've still got all this
and we've got each other, so...

The Kurdish struggle in Kobane
reignited a decades-long campaign

for Kurdish independence in Turkey.

REPORTER: The moment bombs go off

outside a football stadium in
Istanbul,

killing 38 people.

Kurdish militants
say they were responsible.

The most prominent Kurdish armed
separatist group in Turkey

is the PKK, a classified
terrorist organisation in the West.

REPORTER: Once again,
terror has hit Turkey.

The internal conflict has led to

tens of thousands of deaths
on both sides.

After Kobane, the PKK unleashed
a series of bombings,

killing scores of civilians.

REPORTER: As the bombs hit, a local
TV channel was on air.

EXPLOSION

Turkey sees little difference
between the PKK

and the YPG in Syria.

It believes the link between them

means the YPG also poses a threat
to their national security.

Britain has a different view.

The United Kingdom recognises some
similarities in terms of ideology

between PKK and YPG,

but not the direct link that is
claimed

by Turkey, which is why
we proscribe PKK but not YPG.

In 2015, the Turkish president
declared he would take action

against the PKK and the YPG.

REPORTER: The government has vowed
revenge.

"My country and my people can rest
assured," said President Erdogan,

"we will fight the scourge
of terrorism to the end."

Anna arrived in Syria two years
after the battle for Kobane.

The YPG and YPJ were still
rebuilding their militia,

and it opened a training academy
for international fighters

where Anna was posted.

We're on our way to

the Internationalists Academy
of the YPJ,

which is where the young women
from foreign countries

receive their initial training.

Anna spent a lot of time there.

It's quite a wrench to see
these young women

dressed in military fatigues...

..with their Kalashnikovs.
They all look like versions of Anna.

KNOCKS ON DOOR

Rojbin, hello!

Anna's friend Rojbin is still living
in the academy where Anna trained.

Good to see you.

What is this place?

This is the shared space
that everybody uses.

Right.

And this is a sleeping room?

Do you have private space?

No private space?

Yeah.

A month after Anna arrived,

the battle against IS intensified,

and international volunteers
were being sent to the front line.

REPORTER: In Syria, US-backed
Kurdish forces are now thought

to have gained control of nearly
half the city of Raqqa,

the last remaining stronghold of
so-called Islamic State.

Attacks were launched by the YPG
and the YPJ.

GUNFIRE

As a strategic partner of the US
and Britain,

the Kurds were supported by
air strikes

while they fought on the ground.

Suddenly, they just said,
"Who wants to go to Raqqa?"

And we're like, "Oh, shit,
that's...that's...that's the war.

"OK, let's do it."

And a group of us were just driven
straight in

on the back of a pick-up truck

with our guns, waving
at all these children,

feeling like, "Yeah, we're
the business. We're hardcore."

This is life and death.

This is not buggering
around getting annoyed

that the Tube's late,

this is what being alive
is really like.

Anna had only completed a month's
training,

so wasn't allowed to join
the fighting in Raqqa.

Being here, it doesn't really seem
real that they exist,

so I have no conception of
what it's actually going to be like

if we do end up facing them.

Maybe it will be different
after my training,

but I think I'd probably be pretty
useless

because I've never had that
experience or training.

Um...

Hmm.

That's an interesting question.

With the international volunteers,
there was two main groups.

There was the kind of ex-Army
people.

They just wanted to fight Isis.

And then there was the other
people like me and Anna

who were there because of what
they'd heard about this revolution

and wanted to fight for
a left-wing cause.

Alongside the military training,

Anna engaged in discussions
of ideology and politics.

She was given a new Kurdish name,
Helin Qerecox.

Can you tell me what the education
consists of?

What is the enemy?

So what is the aim of the education?

What do you hope to achieve?

I think that's why Anna loved being
here,

because the new movement
was creating the ideal society

which was involving everybody.

Despite the risk of being arrested

if they return to their own
countries,

hundreds of international
volunteers have made their way

to Syria to join the militia
over the past four years.

Sorry, your name?

Avesta. Avesta? Yes.

Is that a Kurdish name?
Yeah. Yeah.

Meeting the YPJ internationals
was a powerful experience.

Their commitment came through
absolutely strongly.

They all have names of martyrs
who have died in the course

of the Rojava revolution,
which feels a bit morbid.

There's too much emphasis
on these martyrs.

But if you look at it from the other
perspective,

what it does is
it keeps the seriousness

of the whole project,
that they are going to face death.

Eleftheria arrived from Germany
four months ago.

In the beginning, I wanted to come
here more to understand, to learn.

But of course, I came here to fight.

It is so hard to understand,
especially for parents.

I want my parents, actually,
to understand.

They say, for example,

"It's good that you do this,
but don't go to war, don't fight."

They still make a difference
between me and other people.

I don't think you could expect them
not to say that.

Yeah, of course.
DIRK LAUGHS

They love you,
they don't want you to be in danger.

I'm ready for this,
as so many people are.

It's not just fighting,

it's building up a really
beautiful world.

Of hope, of freedom.

There is a part of my mind which
would like to say to them,

"Have you really thought about what
would happen when you got killed?

"How it would affect your family?"

But I haven't had the courage,
actually.

Yeah, these are notes that she
made during the education course.

Ooh, this is so small.

I need a microscope to read this.

"In the Middle East, religion killed
the freedom of the individual."

Quite a lot of this is
the ideas of the revolution.

We have some photos.

This is the whole family,
when we were...

..when Anna was really quite small.

Silly smiles. That's Anna.

That's Rose, doing a funny face.

Anna was born prematurely.
Six weeks premature.

She was in an incubator, being fed
breast milk through the nose.

She looked like a little bird.

So she was quite slow to develop,
physically.

In fact, I was concerned about her,

so I took her on forced marches to
try and strengthen her legs up.

Which she protested at,
quite vehemently.

I explained to her,
"It's for your own good, Anna.

"You've got to strengthen your legs
and get strong."

Eventually,
she was in such anguish that,

instead of doing what any normal
child would do

and kind of screaming or ranting or
biting me, she bit her own knuckles.

As she grew older, she didn't really
express her feelings any more.

I think they were too powerful,
and she got the message, at least

from me, that powerful feelings
were, in some way, unacceptable.

Or the expression of them
was unacceptable.

Is this everything?
You said there was a notebook.

All the notebooks are in here.
Uh-huh.

You said there was
one particular notebook?

Anna wrote a diary of her
time in Syria,

which was kept safe to give
to her family.

June.

Now everyone is sleeping
and the house is very calm.

With endless cans of Pepsi
and AK-47s lining the rooms.

It seems so real here,

but I expected it to feel
a bit intangible.

But of course, I'm here,
how could I be anywhere else?

Eva gave me a new name.

It was the name of a friend
who was martyred.

She said that it was a big
responsibility

to be named after a martyr,

and Eva said I'm big,
so I can carry it.

Part of me is terrified that
I'll never go back.

I suppose I don't have to
decide now,

I can wait until my year is up
then figure it out.

I think I have a lot of
introspection and reading to do

before I become a fighter.

It starts from a month after
she arrived in Rojava

and goes all the way through
till just before she was killed.

Now that I've started reading it,

seen her handwriting on the page,
the lovely thing for me

is that we're having a conversation,
although it's just a one-way

conversation,
but I'm listening to her talk.

In a way that she didn't feel
she could talk to me.

She was so happy.

She was, like, content,
and she was where she wanted to be.

She was learning. She was meeting
all these amazing people,

she was doing something,
she was really doing something.

It looked like she was in this
circle of women that were enriching

her life, this was part of her
life journey and her life story.

And she also sent us photos

of the friends that she was making.

And then, whenever we spoke,
it was always very relaxed.

Always in the back of my head,
thinking,

"OK, when is this going
to get dangerous?"

August.

We're finally in military education.

Two women came and showed us
how to take apart the AK-47.

I was nervous that I would
cock it up,

but at least I remembered to take
the ammunition out first,

which a couple of students forgot,
to a chorus of tutting.

One by one, the students took a turn
firing at a stack of rocks.

When it was my turn,
I walked over and took a deep breath

and fired two shots.

Sounds of appreciation erupted
behind me.

It turned out I'd hit
the 60m target both times.

I was pretty chuffed with myself,
and in the minibus

on the way back, Amara said
that I should become a sniper.

I could easily stay here
and help with the building up

and the movement of the academy.

But my aim is to fight,
and I will do so.

Dirk, if you'd known that she'd
wanted to go to the front line,

what would you have said?

I would have said, "I'm really
devastated to hear that you're going

"to fight and I'm desperately
worried and please don't do it."

But then I think that's what
she knew I would have said,

which is why she didn't tell me.

By the end of 2017,
the fight for Raqqa was over.

But for the Syrian Kurds,
this was not the end of the war.

I remember our commander saying,

"We know Turkey's going to invade
at some point,

"they're not going to tolerate
the Rojava revolution continuing.

"They're going to come for us."

But they didn't think it
was going to be yet.

At that point, the whole focus
was on defeating Isis.

RECEP TAYYIP ERDOGAN:

NEWSREADER: Turkish troops
have crossed the border

into northern Syria in a significant
escalation of their battle

against a Kurdish militia.

The Kurdish YPG militia is
backed by the United States,

but viewed by Turkey
as a terrorist organisation.

REPORTER: From the air,
Turkish F-16s struck yesterday.

Their target, the Syrian-Kurdish
militia known as the YPG.

And it wants them pushed back
from the border town of Afrin.

In January,
we were in the Deir ez-Zor region.

Suddenly, we were all just told to
pull out one day and go back

to our main base and then we were
told that Turkey had invaded Afrin.

They sat down with us and asked,
"Who wants to go and defend Afrin

"and who wants to go back to
fighting against Isis?"

And that was the point where I
thought, who's the main threat now?

And it was Turkey.

Turkey has air power
and artillery on its side,

and it's pounding
the Kurdish positions.

We knew when we came back
to our countries,

that no-one's going to be
particularly upset that we've

been off fighting Isis, but Turkey's
a whole different matter.

Turkish jets are pounding a target
at a checkpoint.

Emily Thornberry.
Mr Speaker, we on this

side of the House
unequivocally condemn Turkey

for their disgraceful
assault on Afrin.

If the Foreign Secretary is unable
to join me in condemning Turkey

today, will the Minister of State
at least explain why he believes,

"in securing its own border"
gives them

the right to brutally attack the
innocent Kurdish community in Afrin?

I don't think it's exactly
as the right honourable lady says.

I think that we need to recognise

Turkey's legitimate interest.

Of course, we condemn any
kind of attacks on civilians

and we wish to see
a de-escalation of this,

but the legitimate rights of Turkey,
I believe, should be recognised.

January.

Today is the eighth day
of Turkey's attempted war on Afrin.

Friends are always saying,
"Afrin will be like Kobani,"

which I find a bit scary,

since so many of our friends
died there.

On the news, it said
internationalists had arrived

in Afrin, and I felt jealous.

I want to go so much.

If I'm honest with myself,
for selfish reasons,

as well as altruistic.

I want to be a part of the fighting.

I want to feel my own strength,

to defend myself and my friends.

I watch and read
all the news every day,

see the martyrs' photos
and the funerals.

Maybe that's why I want
to go to Afrin so much,

so I can feel closer
to the struggle.

The decision to send Anna to Afrin

was made by the senior commanders
of the YPJ.

SHE SPEAKS IN OWN LANGUAGE

You are Nisrin? Yes.

THEY SPEAK IN HER LANGUAGE

You knew Anna, my daughter.

What was your relationship?

When did Anna first talk
to you about fighting?

So what changed that you allowed
Helin to go and fight?

Nisrin said she did everything
in her power to dissuade Anna,

so it was quite clear
that her strength of purpose

was too strong even for one
of the top commanders of the YPJ

to do anything about.

She was desperate to be
of some practical use

and to measure herself
against her comrades.

Do you feel that that will make
your grieving easier, in some way,

knowing that she really
was so determined? Yeah.

I have to accept,
and we all have to accept,

that it was her choice,
very much her choice.

There was no doubt in her mind

that she wanted to be
the person she became.

You really have to send us
to Afrin after this.

An exodus.

The seemingly endless stream
of civilians leaving Afrin.

TRANSLATION: We have no money.

We have nothing and we have kids.

All of us left our houses.

Where can we go?

This is what they are escaping.

Turkey is bombarding the mainly
Kurdish town,

trying to force out
fighters from the YPG.

The Turkish state is calling it
a clearing operation

to get rid of terrorists.

But what they really dread
is Kurdish unity - a kind

of independent Kurdish
autonomous region.

Kurdish people see it
as their kind of heartland.

If Afrin goes,
then Rojava could fall next.

We heard a lot of Isis fighters

had managed to get through
the desert into Turkey

and had been recruited
into the militias, the proxy forces,

that Turkey was using
to invade Afrin.

Despite these claims, Turkey has
denied using IS fighters in Afrin.

Today is the 37th day
of the Afrin Resistance.

Nisrin called us in
and said we could go to Afrin.

I happily and easily lied to Dad
yesterday on the phone, saying

that I was pretty sure friends
wouldn't let me go.

I'm ready to fight for this land
and even die for it, if necessary,

although I'd rather not.

We can't eliminate risk

but, obviously, every parent
entertains that fear.

If something happens to my child,
it will be my fault.

That's why
it's such a powerful fear.

Once they get older,
as a parent, I can't...

..allow that fear to govern
my relationship with them.

I still have to examine myself
to ask myself whether

I was a...

..the right kind of parent
for Anna.

If I wasn't, there isn't anything
I can do about it now but, um...

Was I too laissez faire?

Was I too uninvolved?

Was I too lazy?

Was I too trusting?

As pro-Turkish troops began
encircling the city,

Anna was given permission
to travel to Afrin.

Before she left,
she recorded a video.

My name is Helin Qerecox.

My name from before
was Anna Campbell.

I'm very happy and proud
to be going to Afrin.

The attacks of the Turkish state
against the Kurdish people

are very shocking and heavy,

and I'm happy to join my friends

to defend ourselves.

With the memory of the friends
that have followed Shaheed

in this operation,
and in the whole war,

then I will fight even stronger.

We kind of all expected there was
going to be a big last stand

in Afrin city.

We were going to dig in

and the Turkish forces
were going to annihilate us.

This is the end.
We've got a couple of weeks to live.

This is our last stand.

We're fighting and dying for Rojava.

This is what we came for.

One afternoon, artillery shells
started dropping into the city...

..and they just started shelling
the civilians.

Suddenly, the order came
to pull out...

..and I was like, "But...but
we're here to make our last stand.

"What are you talking about?"

They said, "No, it's better to get
out and fight another day.

"There's no point
just being exterminated here."

Jamie and his unit
eventually evacuated the city

after 150,000 civilians had fled.

He relocated to a nearby
Kurdish town on 15th March.

We were just in this town, and then
this American guy came up and said,

"Some British girl's been killed."

My heart was just like,
"That has to be Anna."

A friend of Anna's came up

and showed us on the map
what had happened.

They'd been moved just, I think,
just outside the city

knocked her into a forward position,

and then an air strike
had just killed her.

REPORTER: A British woman has
been killed in northern Syria

while fighting
alongside Kurdish forces.

It's understood that Anna Campbell,
who was 26 and from Lewes

in East Sussex, died in the town
of Afrin, which has been the target

of a Turkish offensive.

It was a Sunday evening
when the doorbell rang.

I said, "Who is it?"

And she said, "You don't know me.
My name's Jo."

So I pressed the buzzer.

They came up and, as they came
to the top of the stairs,

I can vividly remember this,
you know, how...

..these moments are seared
on your memory.

I said, "I fear the worst."

And Jo nodded.

At that moment, I just knew.

I said, "Come in and sit down."

And then I leant against
the doorframe and I wept.

And, um...

..and I sat down in the chair
and I wept for a long time.

I will always have loads of regret

and always have this...
this haunting feeling

that...that I should have looked
after my little sister...

..better.

Maybe then she would grow up
to be an old lady.

Everyone was calling her
a martyr and a hero.

You were already a hero.

I feel like there's this hole.

There's a massive hole that I keep,

like, coming across and almost
tripping up on and falling into.

And it's this hole
where she should be.

From that point on,
I decided straight away

that the best thing I could do in
Anna's memory was to thump her tub.

Doing that was and still is...

..the only thing
I can do for her now.

When my daughter came here,

she found something precious.

The longer she stayed here,

the more precious it became...

..until she was willing
to lay down her life...

..for these precious people
that she had learned to love.

I know that she would be happy
for her body

to be here with her friends,

because Rojava became
my daughter's home.

I went through quite a lot
of rage with her, I think.

I was like, "How could you willingly
cause everyone you know

"so much pain?"

And it's just...it's just bigger
than that. She was braver than that.

The world has so much going on in it

and it's bigger than
our own tiny pieces of grief.

I think she probably weighed it up
and she realised that, you know,

we could handle it
and we'll be brave enough

and we've got each other.