Aidan James, 28, is on trial in London for engaging in acts of terrorism and attending a place used for terrorist training. The YPG is not a proscribed organisation in the UK, although the PKK is on the list of banned groups.
A British jury has been shown journal entries made by a man from Liverpool who travelled to Syria to fight with the Kurdish YPG against Daesh in 2017.
“My so-called country should be proud of the work us volunteers are doing as they have failed to help,” James wrote in October 2017.
James admits travelling to Syria, via northern Iraq, in the autumn of 2017 but he denies two counts of engaging in acts of terrorism and one charge of attending a placed used for terrorist training.
Mark Heywood QC, prosecuting, asked Detective Constable Anna Dobson from Merseyside Police about images and a video they found on James' phone when he was arrested on his return to Britain in 2018.
The jury was shown the video — believed to have been filmed in Makhmur, a Kurdish village in northern Iraq — in which James is shown practising firing a long-barrelled weapon.
Mr Heywood then read out long extracts from James' journal in which he talks about the frustration he felt in Makhmur, waiting to be sent over the border into Syria and onto the frontline against Daesh.
“I am now squad's commander, which is good, more responsibility and because I will sacrifice myself no problem, for my boys,” James recorded in his journal…
