'Voice of Aleppo' Bana al-Abed granted Turkish citizenship

Bana al-Abed, the 8 year-old girl, who captured the world's attention last year with her vivid portrayals of Syria's war on Twitter during the siege of east Aleppo has been granted Turkish citizenship.

Al-Abed along with the other four members of her family were presented with Turkish ID cards during a ceremony at the presidential compound in Ankara in the presence of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Bana's mother Fatmeh confirmed in comment to The New Arab.

For her part al-Abed, who has over 300,000 followers on Twitter, said that she was looking forward to joining a Turkish school for the new academic year after her own school in east Aleppo was destroyed by conflict. 

"Despite my joy at receiving Turkish citizenship, and the reception of the president, I will return to Aleppo one day and rebuild houses and schools," Al Abed said in comment to The New Arab, adding that she would continue to Tweet about the suffering of the Syrian people as long as war racked her homeland. 

Al-Abed composes tweets with the help of her mother Fatmeh, a former English teacher. 

Along with her family, al-Abed was evacuated from the devastated streets of east Aleppo to Turkey in December 2016 after pro-regime forces stormed the area, taking control of all Aleppo. 

She is currently in the process of writing a memoir about her distressing experiences of war in Syria provisionally titled Dead World. It is scheduled to be published in autumn 2017 by international publisher Simon & Schuster.