President Erdoğan hosts seven-year-old ‘Syrian Twitter girl’ Bana in Ankara

ANKARA

REUTERS photo

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan hosted on Dec. 21 the seven-year-old “Syrian Twitter girl” Bana Alabed who has attracted the world’s attention while tweeting from war-torn Aleppo, state-run Anadolu Agency has reported.

Erdoğan hosted Bana and her family in the Presidential Palace in Ankara.  

Alabed had been evacuated from the divided Syrian city of Aleppo on Dec. 19, a Turkish NGO had announced on social media.

Her account which has hundreds of thousands of followers, has frequently posted photos of the destruction in Aleppo including her rubble-littered street, while people have tweeted messages of support and concern, they became increasingly worried for her life when tweets became less frequent.



Alabed’s last tweet from her mother, Fatemah, before the evacuation, made an appeal to Erdoğan and Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, and called to put a fragile cease-fire back on track after frequent delays.

“Dear @MevlutCavusoglu & @RT_Erdogan please please please make this ceasefire work & get us out now. We are so tired. -Fatemah #Aleppo,” Fatemah tweeted to Turkish politicians. 

“Difficulties on the ground won’t deter us, sister. Rest assured that we are doing all to get you and thousands of others to safety,” Çavuşoğlu responded in a tweet on Dec. 19. 

At least 15,000 children are among the more than 300,000 people who have been killed in Syria’s five-year war.

Evacuation from the rebel-held areas of Aleppo has restarted after further delays, which put on hold the ceasefire agreement brokered by Turkey and Russia.

Some 37,500 people were evacuated from Aleppo since first departure on Dec. 15, according to Turkish officials.